This is a thirteen-year-old boy's journey into magical healing. It is a time of awakening.

Awakening to who you are, what you are meant to be, of friends and young love, of power and its use for good or evil.

Book I is the book of beginnings.

Book II outlines the further adventures of Julian, Nicole and Brian after they have grown up. What's at stake is magnified exponentially as the extent and full power of the Tree becomes realized.

Book III...has not been written yet.

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I CHAPTER 01

"Okay. I guess that about does it for today." Big Bobby clapped the dust off his hands. He reached up and wiped his nose, snorting. As he turned, he began to lead his gang back out of the washroom. "We'll see you around...Daddy Short

Leg!" Everyone in the gang laughed.

After Big Bobby and his boys had gone, Julian wandered over to the stall and fished out his left shoe from the toilet bowl. He wrung it out the best he could.

Well, at least this time, there had only been water in the bowl.

He bent down, worked his shoe back on and tied it up. He rose to his feet. It was squishing with every step. Sighing, Julian slung his bag up onto his shoulder and began to limp out of the washroom to join the rest of his class.

~~~

About three years ago, Julian was involved in a serious car crash. His father was driving at the time. Julian was not wearing a seatbelt, so when the two cars hit each other head on, he was thrown clear through his own windshield and then bashed against a tree some ten feet away. This broke his left femur, or thighbone, in three different places. Multiple surgeries to the area did not help.

In fact, a few times, infection set in to the bones and made the problem worse.

In the end, despite everything that the doctors could do, Julian was left with one leg that was a good four inches shorter than his other one.

He was nine at the time and already felt like an old man. He was completely spent in body and spirit. At that point, the doctors told him and his mother

that they should hold off on more surgery. Let's give it some time, they said. Let Julian's body recover a little first. We can come back and review the case when he is stronger.

That was three years ago.

Meanwhile, they had made Julian a left shoe with a lift built in, so he wouldn't have to walk around all day with a limp, which would lead to hip pain, they said, back pain and many other problems too.

Well, it was worth a try, anyway. But in the real world, any leg length discrepancy of more than two inches always produced a limp, even if just a small one, no matter how well your shoes had been made. And of course, limp or no limp, it didn't really matter in the end. There was still your obviously shorter left leg and if not that, your fancy shmancy medical shoes. Children being children, would always flock to the kid who wasn't one hundred percent like all the other kids, and then make fun of him based on whatever it was that made him different.

For Julian, this was what he had found to be true over all of the last three years, whatever the neighbourhood, whatever the school, whatever the class. Yes, the other kids always found out about your leg. And they would always tease you. It was just a matter of how far the local bully would take the teasing on any given day.

Well today, Julian thought, at least they didn't take my glasses. They could have thrown them down the toilet too, along with the old left shoe. But now, at least he could see. Julian was blind as a vampire in the sun without them.

The eye doctor had told Julian and his parents that Julian's eyes were the worst he had seen in a long time. While Julian could not be classified strictly as an albino, he definitely had a pigment problem that not only gave him sensitive skin but also turned his eyes red. He shared both of these features with his father.

It took Julian another two minutes to find the rest of his class in the museum.

They were on a field trip today, and when he spotted the other kids, they were crowded around the nice lady tour guide, Ms. Holmes, with her horn-rimmed glasses and fine English accent. As Julian shuffled over to them, she was just gearing up to ask the group another question.

"How many of you have heard of the Neanderthal man?"

A dozen hands shot up.

"And how many of you know why we call him the Neanderthal man?"

The hands drifted back down.

"Well, I'll tell you a little story." She pointed to the display behind her. "Once upon a time, back in 1856, workers were digging for lime in the Neander Valley of western Germany, when they found some strange bones in an old cave and thought they belonged to a dead bear from long, long ago. It was only after much research and eight years later, did they finally realize that what they had found, in fact, were the remains of a previously unknown species of human.

They decided to call this new found human, Homo Neanderthalensis."

Some children heard the word 'homo' and laughed.

The guide went on to tell the kids more information about the Neanderthal man exhibit, and then some of the other displays in the same room as well, which included artefacts found from all over different parts of Germany, because that was the theme in this new wing of the museum.

"And how many of you have heard of St. Boniface?"

Julian's gaze wandered over to the group's edge and he couldn't hear Ms. Holmes anymore. He couldn't hear her, because standing off to the side nearly by the next exhibit was Nicole, with a paper pad in her hands and taking notes.

She had her brows furrowed and her tongue caught at the side of her mouth as she bent the pencil to her will. Julian smiled and flushed a little. Nicole had the longest, shiniest blonde hair he had ever seen in his whole life. Even with all the people he has seen on TV and on line. Besides, those girls on TV weren't real.

Nicole was real. She was right here. The only problem was...

Julian's thought was interrupted. Big Bobby had sneaked in from nowhere, stepped up behind Nicole and put his arm around her. Nicole reached up and brushed it off. Big Bobby laughed. But he didn't back away. He kept poking her and teasing her and making like he was going to snatch her notebook away.

Julian took a step toward the pair and then stopped again.

"Ahem!" Ms. Holmes had paused in her monologue and was glaring at Bobby.

Bobby stopped what he was doing. Nicole moved closer to the front of the group.

"This way, kids!" Ms. Holmes shuffled off to the next exhibit with the gaggle of Eighth Graders behind her. As the group and then Big Bobby passed by Julian, the bully stomped up to him and made a face. "Boo!"

Julian jerked back. He bumped up against a man standing by the booth behind him. Julian's bag slipped off his shoulder and its contents spilled out all over the floor.

Bobby laughed. He marched off to join the group.

Julian shook his head. He bent down to pick up his things and found that his best friend, Brian, had come over to help him. "You all right?"

Julian nodded. He glanced up at the man he had bumped into just now and noticed that he was actually a security guard who worked at the museum. He smiled at the guard. The guard smiled back. The exhibit that the man was perched in front of was different from the other ones in the area. It was actually roped off and had another guard standing on the far side too, with his arms crossed in front of his chest.

Julian finished picking up his things. He stood up, but then noticed that a few of his pens had rolled into the special exhibit well beyond the ropes. He made to go in after them.

"That's all right," the guard said. "You stay there. I'll get them for you." The guard retrieved the pens and handed them off to Julian. "There you go."

Julian smiled and nodded. "Thanks."

He shifted his gaze to glance at the poster up on the wall beside the exhibit. It was a picture of a tree, with a heading that read, 'Donar's Oak,' along the very top. The rest of the writing beneath this heading was too small to read at a distance. By the side of the poster was a rectangular glass case on a display table with what appeared to be a chunk of driftwood in it. It looked ancient and black with worn out twigs shooting off its sides at different points.

"Come on." Brian nudged him on the shoulder. "We gotta go."

Julian nodded. He checked the zipper on his bag and then the two of them lumbered off to join the group

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 02

When Julian got home to his apartment after school that day, his mom told him to change out of his clothes because she wanted to do a load of laundry. He said okay and went into his room. He stripped down to his underpants, took his things into the bathroom and threw them into the hamper. He sauntered back into his room.

Unzipping his shoulder bag, he went to dig his homework out and found it was still a mess inside from earlier. His pens and other things were all mixed up with everything else. And there was this gritty, black dirt everywhere too.

He shook his head. “Stupid Bobby.”

Reaching in, he removed the heavier books first, and then upended the whole bag and shook it. All manners of scattered bits and pieces fell onto the floor and he began to pick them up one by one. And there it was.

“What the…” Julian picked it up. He didn’t know what it was. He had never seen anything quite like it.

It looked like a twig. But a really old one. Or a piece of root. Some kind of plant, anyway. Julian screwed up his eyes and peered close at it. It measured about half an inch by three. It was cylindrical, like a twig from a tree, but a straight twig.

All worn and rough to the touch, it looked about a million years old. It was black.

It wasn’t exactly like dirt, though. The blackness was just its natural colour.

He happened to glance at his hands. His palms and fingers were now covered in black soot. Like the dirt in the bag.

“Ew!”

The grit must be continuously sloughing off the twig somehow…

“Gross!”

He tossed it off to one side and rushed over to the sink in the bathroom. Turning the water on, he tried wiping off the soot with the first spurt of water that came gushing out. But as soon as the soot mixed with water, it thickened and turned into a paste, which made it even harder to get off.

“Julian!” His mother stood in the doorway, hands on her hips. “What on earth are you trying to do in here? It’s such a mess…”

“Mom! I’m naked!” Julian squirmed off to one side.

She laughed. “Yeah, like I’ve never seen you naked.”

“Mom!” He squirmed in the other direction. He slipped and fell to the floor, bum first. His back banged up against the edge of the tub. “Ow!”

His mother gasped and rushed forward. Her hands flew out to him, to his body, to his hands. “Are you all right?”

“Mom…” He sat up. He rubbed his back and flinched from the pain.

“What is this stuff?” In the process of helping him, she had picked up wads of the thick salve that Julian had smeared all over his hands. Now it was all over her hands too. Ignoring it for the moment, she went to help him up.

Julian went to stand up but winced when he put weight on his left leg.

“What’s wrong, honey?” His mom eased him down again. “Is it your leg?” She went to examine it.

“I must’ve pulled it. I’m all right, Mom. Don’t worry. It’s just a cramp.” He took his thigh in his hands, just above the left knee and began to rub it down, massaging it.

“Poor baby.” She joined in too and helped to massage the pulled muscle. “You know you have to be more careful with this leg. The doctor said…”

“I know, Mom. I know…”

She shook her head. She stopped talking.

After another two minutes, Julian asked her to stop. “I’m better now, Mom.

Thanks.” He stood up.

Together, they went to the sink and rinsed the last of the salve off under the water. It was sticky and would only come off after they turned the hot water on full blast. It was all over his thigh too.

His mom checked the mess in the bathroom once more. “Finish cleaning up in here and come out for dinner. It’s probably cold by now.” She wiped the back of her hand on her brow. She took a few breaths in and out, but deeply. “Man! I must be getting old.”

“What? You all right

“No. I’m just feeling a little winded somehow. Must’ve got up too quickly.” She smiled and went into the kitchen.

~~~

The next morning, when Julian woke, he felt a little odd but couldn’t quite place what it was. It was like the room was brighter somehow. And the air smelled fresher too. Everything looked…new!

Julian frowned. Then he shrugged and slipped out of bed. He began to lumber over to the kitchen. Clunk, clunk, clunk.

Julian stopped. He knitted his brows together. Why does that not sound right?

Then it hit him. He looked down.

“Oh my God!”

He lifted his left leg. Then his right. He jumped up and down and then up and down and then up and down. He yanked down his pyjama pants and stared at his legs.

They were the same length. The—same—length.

“Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!”

He jumped up and down again for another two minutes and got to breathing hard. “Okay, calm down, calm down…”

He raced into his mom’s room. “Mom!”

She wasn’t there.

He flew off into the kitchen. There was a note on the counter.

“Morning shift. Sandwich for lunch on the counter. Love ya.”

“Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!”

He ran back and forth in the small apartment for another two minutes.

“Shoes, shoes, shoes…” He rummaged through the closet by the front door and only found shoes for his mother. Of course, she had thrown out his shoes from three years ago, from before the accident. He only had two pairs of his special ones now. That’s no good.

He raced off into his mom’s room and rifled through her closet. He knew he had seen them somewhere here before.

There! Squished beneath a stack of cardboard boxes, he found a pair of old, worn out runners, all bent out of shape from time and sitting here in the humidity.

His dad’s old things. They were Converses, and about a size or two too big. No problem. Julian put on another pair of socks, some tissue paper, and then shoved his feet, new feet mind you, into the shoes and he was good to go. He rushed back into his room, got changed, picked up his school things and dashed out of the apartment.

Oops. Almost forgot. Julian rushed back into his apartment. He whooshed into his room. From the floor, he tweezed up the twig from the night before, placed it into a plastic baggie and sealed the top. He gave it a big, wet, sloppy kiss.

Smack! “I love you!” With reverence, he tucked it into his pants pocket. He patted it twice. He smiled.

“Yea!” He shot his arms up into the air. He raced out of his apartment, locked the front door and took off.

Julian ran outside. He ran to the park nearby. Everywhere he went, he went running. Running never felt so good! It had been so long. So long! He had completely forgotten what normal running felt like! His legs were even and they pounded themselves out in a normal, even rhythm on the field, on the sidewalk, on the street when he was crossing one. He was so fast! He was running faster than everybody else on the street, not that anyone else was running, of course.

Once or twice, he slipped on the snow and fell. But he laughed, picked himself up and tore off running again. He ran through another park that was on the way to his school.

Tearing around the bend, he ran into a bearded old man and nearly knocked him over. “I’m sorry! Sir…”

“Whoa! Slow down, son!”

“I’m sorry!” He took off again. Running.

In his mind was just one word. “Brian!”

He made it to school in half his normal time.

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 03

Julian flew into the school and hunted down Brian. “Hey…Brian!”

Brian was on his way to homeroom. “Yeah, what?”

Julian paused and breathed. He dropped his hands onto his knees. He was completely out of breath. “You’ll…you’ll…never believe…”

Brian took a step back and scratched his head. “You know, there’s something different about you…”

“Yeah, I know!” A little better now, Julian straightened up.

“But…what is it?” Brian crossed his arms. He began treading around Julian in a circle, sizing him up.

Julian bounced up and down. Then on one foot and then the other. “Look at me!

Look at me!”

Brian’s eyes shot wide. “You’re not limping! Your leg! Your leg!”

“My leg!”

“Your leg’s all right!”

“Yea!”

The two boys hugged each other, jumped up and down and screamed. All the people in the hallway turned and frowned at them as they hurried by and on to their homerooms.

“So, what happened?” Brian clapped his friend on the shoulder. “Did you get some kind of special medicine or something?”

“Well, kind of…” Julian reached up and adjusted his glasses.

“Wow, that doctor of yours must be something else!”

Julian laughed.

“Hey I gotta head off to homeroom. I’ve been late like everyday for a month…” Brian began drifting away.

“But I haven’t told you…”

“Tell me later then…” Brian disappeared down the hall.

Later turned out not to be lunch. Julian didn’t share the same lunch period as Brian that day. In fact, that particular day, the two boys didn’t have any classes together, so Julian didn’t get a chance to see his friend again until well after school. Keeping a secret this size was a little like having a bladder infection. If you’ve ever had one, you’d know.

Julian found his friend, finally, in the boys’ locker room, after school, changing and getting ready for basketball practice. This was the first year that Brian had made the team.

Brian was sitting on a bench, tying his shoe. Julian rushed over to him. “Hey, I still have to tell you about that thing. It’s about my leg.”

“Why? I thought it was better.”

“It is better! But I haven’t told you how I got better.”

“Okay, but can’t it wait until after practice?”

“It’s important.”

“How important can it be? After practice, okay?” Brian smiled. He finished doing up his shoe and raced out into the gym. Julian sighed. He shrugged. Hoisting his bag up to his shoulder, he followed the other boys and wandered out into the gym and the basketball court.

Outside, Julian trudged over to the far end of the court and plopped himself down onto a bench. This was his usual spot for basketball practice. The coach was just telling the boys on the team to start warming up, grab some balls out of the storage bin and practice shooting. He had a few things to take care of first.

He told them to behave, and this meant you. He was speaking to the tallest boy on the team, who of course, was Big Bobby. The coach stomped back into his office.

Big Bobby was one of those boys that came back after the summer holidays and into grade eight completely different. The rest of the boys still looked like boys. Bobby looked like someone’s uncle. With what could pass for a real moustache on his lip and hair in other places to boot, most people who didn’t know him, and a lot of people who did, tended to look up to Bobby when they ran into him and called him sir. He was a wiz at basketball…and not much else.

At the very least, he wasn’t very good with the academics and so made it a point to bully everyone else who was. Basically, the worst nightmare and scourge of the whole of geekdom incarnate.

Julian liked basketball. Watching it, anyway. That was about as close as he ever got. With his leg from the accident, he never bothered to try out for the team. But he enjoyed being around it so much, he sneaked into the practices most times to watch the other boys play from the balcony. After the coach started noticing, he was kind enough to get Julian to come by and help out as coach assistant, which was to say, assistant to the coach, which was very different from assistant coach, just so you know. Julian helped out with the

scheduling, communication between school departments, basically all the computer things and paperwork that the real coach wasn’t so good at and didn’t want to do anyway.

As Julian watched them practice, an argument broke out on the floor.

At first, things had started off as a verbal argument. Brian was yelling at Big Bobby and Bobby was yelling right back.

“Uh oh.” Julian got up from the bench. He knew the pattern.

Whenever Big Bobby was involved, verbal arguments tended to deteriorate into non-verbal arguments and that’s when in most cases, Big Bobby would win.

This incident was no exception.

Brian was pushed to the floor. He got up. He charged at the bigger boy and was flung aside like a rag doll. Brian tumbled to the floor, spinning, and didn’t get up this time. He was holding his left ankle tight and gritting his teeth.

“Break it up! Break it up!” The coach strode out of his office, stepped up and spread the kids out. “What’s going on here?”

Bobby pointed at Brian. “He started it!”

The coach marched up to Brian. He crouched down over him. “Where’s it hurt, son?”

The coach examined Brian’s ankle. He told Brian to get to the nurse’s office to see if she was still there. He told Julian to go with him. Julian hurried into the locker room and grabbed Brian’s things. By the time he had Brian’s arm over his shoulder and then moved off into the hallway, the other boys had gone back to practice and Bobby was sitting, sulking on the bench. The two buddies let the gym doors slam shut behind them.

“I don’t want to go to the nurse’s office.” Brian winced with every step. “I’m fine.

Just help me home.”

Julian regarded his friend. He nodded. “Okay. Just sec.”

In the hallway, they stopped where they were for a moment. Julian eased Brian down to sit on the floor. Teasing off Brian’s shoe and then sock, he bent down to look at the ankle. It was swollen. Though the ankle itself was not discoloured, a black and blue bruise rimmed the entire outside edge of the left foot.

Julian glanced up. Brian had his eyes closed and his lids were twitching. He was sweating.

“Hey, do you mind if we tried something?” Julian didn’t wait for an answer.

Removing the plastic bag and the twig from his pocket, he opened it and took out some of the black soot that had already collected inside the bag. He stepped over to the nearby water fountain. He added a few drops. Mixing it in his palm, he formed a sticky paste with the material, just like he did by accident last night in his bathroom. He edged back to Brian’s side. He stared at the paste in his palm. He pulled a big breath in and then let it whoosh out again.

Reaching over, Julian applied the homemade salve onto the edge of Brian’s foot and worked it in, like an ointment. Even as he applied it, the salve heated up against his palm but it was a soothing heat. Relaxing. Comforting. And it glowed and he was surprised he hadn’t noticed all of this yesterday. A wan light that you had to concentrate to see, but it was there. Brian didn’t see it, because he was still scrunching up his eyes against the pain. Julian kept rubbing.

Within seconds, the black and blue colour to Brian’s foot was gone. The swelling was down too.

Brian opened his eyes. He blinked them several times. Taking his hand away, he took a look down at his foot. “How did you do that?” He smiled. He turned his foot this way and that to get a good look.

“I don’t know.” Julian sat back. He wiped his hand over his forehead and realized he was sweating. And his heart was racing a little. And he was kind of tired, like winded. He glanced over at Brian.

Brian had on the silliest grin Julian had ever seen. But there was something else. There was a look in there somewhere, maybe in his eyes. In a way, Julian could see that Brian was feeling less pain, like he was suffering less, all because of something that Julian himself did, a gift he gave. And this brought forth in Julian a feeling, that look in Brian’s eyes, a feeling, a rush, like he had never, ever experienced before in his whole, entire life. And it felt good. Like amazing!

“What is that?” Brian pointed at the twig in the bag that Julian had tossed aside for the moment. “Is that what you used? To make my foot better?”

“Yeah, I guess.” He stood, stepped over to the fountain and began cleaning up.

“How…where did you get it?”

Julian shrugged. “I think I must’ve picked it up at the museum.” He adjusted his glasses.

Brian’s eyes flew wide. “Oh, I get it! That’s how your leg got better!”

Julian nodded his head up and down and grinned. Now, finally going into some of the details, he outlined to his friend what had really happened to his leg last night.

Brian frowned. “So why didn’t you tell me before?”

Julian bounced to his feet. “I’ve been trying to tell you all day!” He began to pace. “I was going to tell you, but then there was homeroom, and then we had no classes together, and then the practice…”

Brian shrugged. “So what are you going to do now…” His eyes shot wide. He sat up. “Have you told your mom?”

Julian shook his head.

“Have you told anybody?”

He shook again. “Okay, don’t tell anyone, all right?” He scanned to his left and right. He motioned for Julian to move in closer and then he whispered. “You gotta keep this a secret or else some government people are going to come and take it from you.”

“What?”

“I’ve seen it on TV. Trust me.”

Julian scoffed. “Come on.” He put the twig back in his pocket. “Let’s go home. I don’t want to sit here.”

“Okay, but you gotta believe me…” Brian went to get up but nearly lost his balance. “Ow.”

“Hey, I thought it was better.”

Brian lifted up his left foot and wiggled it around. “It is better. Than before.

There’s still just a bit of pain…”

“That’s funny. But the bruise is all gone.”

Brian looked at his foot. He shrugged. “Well, at least the bruise is gone. Here, help me, would you?” He slipped his school bag onto his other shoulder so

Julian could stand on his right side. Leaning on him like that, Brian hobbled down the hallway and the two began to make their way back home.

Outside, the sun had gone out and it was time for the streetlamps to take over.

There was just a touch of blowing snow and it was chilly.

“So, how do you think it works?” asked Brian. “You think you just rub the stuff on and it heals whatever?”

“I don’t know. I really don’t know much about it.” Slowly, the two became wee shadows, trailing off down the street, passing under one streetlamp, and then another.

“Do you think it’ll heal just about anything?”

“I don’t know? Why are you asking me…”

Their voices trailed off.

“I wonder what else it’s good for. I got a wart on my other foot…”

~~~

When Julian got home, his mom was already there so he showed her his leg.

She nearly fainted. After the initial jumping and squealing, he had to sit her down just to be sure. She asked him what happened and he said he didn’t know. He just woke up like that. She cried. And then she began to worry and swore she’d have to call the doctor first thing the next morning. Julian said okay.

He returned to his room. Tossing aside his bag, he sat down on the edge of his bed and tried to take in all the things that had happened over the last two days.

Here he was, just an ordinary kid. But now he’s found something that could potentially be a really powerful tool. What was he supposed to do with it? Was he supposed to tell everyone? Or no one? There were such things as bad people in the world. This he knew for himself and not just because of what Brian had

said. A lot of things could go wrong. And yet, he could end up helping a huge number of needy people.

Julian laid back on his bed. He sighed.

But then of course, in his mind, even from the very first moment, there was really only one person that he had been thinking about all along. Only one person who made any difference at all.

He rolled over toward his bedside table and picked up his cell. He checked to make sure his mom was nowhere around. As quietly as he could, he beeped in the number. He knew it off by heart. He also knew that no one would pick up. No one ever did. But he left a message. Then he went to sleep.

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 04

The next morning, Julian got up, got dressed and bustled into the kitchen as usual. “Did we get any calls last night? I mean, like after I went to bed?”

Mom was still making sandwiches for lunch that day. “No. Who’d you call?”

“Nobody.”

His mom stopped. Turning to him, she squared her hands on her hips. “Julian,

you know you aren’t supposed to call. The doctor said…”

“I wanna go see him.”

“We’ve been over this. He’s been worse these last few months. The doctor said…”

“I don’t care what the doctor said.” The room was still. Julian reached up and adjusted his glasses. “What if the doctors don’t know everything? There’s stuff

out there, maybe new stuff, that maybe doctors don’t know about yet, Mom. It’s been two months. I want to see him.”

“I’ll call the doctors and see if…”

He grabbed his sandwiches off the counter and left, slamming the door behind him as he went.

~~~

While waiting for the elevator, Julian glanced back and saw his neighbour from down the hall, a young man named Daniel. He was all bent up trying to balance three cardboard boxes in a stack in his right arm, while reaching out his left to lock up his apartment door at the same time. He managed to get the door shut, but the box on top slipped off and tumbled to the ground. It busted open and odds and ends cascaded all over the floor around him.

“Dammit!”

Julian rushed over and began to help him pick up the pieces. “Hey, Daniel.”

“Oh, Julian! You’re a life saver!”

As the two continued to clean up the mess, Julian noticed there were labels on all the boxes—kitchen, dining room and den. “So, I guess you’re finally moving out.”

“I was. I mean, I am. Still. I’ll be gone in a couple of weeks. It’s a slow process.”

The two put the last few things back in the box. Daniel sighed. He sat back on the floor and put his back to the wall. “Man, I’m exhausted.” He turned to Julian.

“So, how’ve you been? I haven’t seen you since…like the holidays.”

Julian nodded. “All right. I guess.”

Daniel glanced toward Julian’s door. “What’s the matter? ‘Mom trouble’?” He

Smiled Julian smiled back. “You don’t miss much, do you? Must be because you’re a fancy doctor now and all…”

They laughed.

Daniel had lived down the hall from Julian for as long as he could remember.

Daniel was like an older brother to him. Over the years, he always helped Julian with his homework whenever he needed it. For free. Julian’s mom really appreciated that part. Daniel was smart in school. In college, he applied to

Medicine and got in. He finished some time ago and now he’s been a doctor for about a year and half. He’s finally put some money together and that’s why he was moving out, getting a place a little nicer, a little closer to the hospital where he worked.

“It must be nice, being a doctor.” Julian was still teasing. “You must be swimming in the money now.”

Daniel didn’t laugh, only smiled. “Listen, Julian. I know what a lot of people think. And I’ve heard what your mom tells you sometimes and that she wants you to be a doctor too, mostly because she wants you to be in a career where you can make a lot of money and have a better life for yourself, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But let me tell you this. If money is the only reason you have for becoming a doctor, you won’t last very long in this business.”

“So, why do you do it then? I mean, like you, yourself?”

Daniel shrugged. He stared at the wall. “Me, I like pediatrics. Even though a lot of times, I’m up all night, running around the hospital, looking up results for this, that and the other, and kids on the whole ward are screaming their heads off and their parents are driving me crazy…”

“Sounds awful.”

Daniel turned to him and smiled. “Doesn’t it?”

“Then why?”

“I don’t know.” He returned his gaze to the far wall. “Sometimes I really don’t know why. And it’s not like it doesn’t take a lot out of me. Sometimes, it really exhausts me.” He chuckled. “You ever feel like you’re completely drained? Like there’s nothing left in you to give?”

Julian nodded.

“And then you turn and look at your patient. That little kid who’s hurt his leg, or going through chemo and he’s lost all his hair. There’s something in the look of a little child. Something in their eyes. And you know you’ve made their pain a little less. And they feel better. Maybe just a little bit. And it’s like nothing else you’ve ever experienced. Nothing else…” He turned to Julian. “…and that’s when you know you have to be a doctor. There is no other choice. That’s who you have to be.”

Julian nodded. He smiled. He remembered yesterday when he was with Brian.

Daniel got up. He went to grab the boxes.

Julian stood too. “Here, let me help you.”

Julian happened to look and saw that the doctor had a bruise on his arm.

“How’d you get that?”

Daniel glanced down at the injury. “I was moving some heavy boxes yesterday, and I must have wrenched out my elbow. Didn’t even feel it at the time.”

“Elbow?” Julian pointed to the bruise further down the forearm. “So, how come the bruise is over here, and not…” He indicated the elbow. “…there?”

Daniel smiled. “Oh, that’s just how the human body works. I bet you didn’t know that, did you? Sometimes, when one part of the body gets hurt, the blood from the broken vessels that seeps out, that is, the bruise, actually gathers somewhere else, away from the actual site of injury. Pretty neat, huh?”

Julian smiled and nodded.

~~~

Julian helped Daniel take his boxes to his car. For a reward, Daniel drove him to school.

At lunch, Julian finished his food early and rushed into the library. He got on line.

He confirmed the information that Daniel had told him. He also read up on some other topics, like orthopedics, leg length discrepancies and also mental illness, schizophrenia in particular. He’d never looked these up before, because he had always avoided thinking about becoming a doctor. Probably because his mom had always pushed him to be one. Now he sucked up the information from the screen like a vampire because all of a sudden, it was just so interesting to him. Wow! But of course, he would never tell his mom that, not if she tried to pry it from him with a crowbar.

He met Brian after school. He led him to the washroom. They checked the stalls. Nobody was there.

“Does your ankle still hurt?” Julian fished out the baggie and the twig from his pocket.

Brian nodded. “I’m all right, though. I’m sure it’ll be better tomorrow.”

“I wanna try something. Take off your shoe.” Julian went over to the sink. Like before, he worked up a wad of the paste as Brian slipped off his shoe and then his sock.

“What? Are we doing that again?”

Julian nodded. “I think we missed some spots yesterday.” He rubbed it on. And this time, not just the edge of Brian’s left foot where the bruise had been, but also over the entire ankle, and then the rest of the calf as well, just to be sure.

Like before, the area heated up. It glowed.

It took about thirty seconds.

“Wow. It’s working.” Brian worked his ankle forward and back. Side to side. He jumped up and down on it.

“Stop…” Julian had a little bit left. He slathered it over his friends left knee and that used it all up. He went over to the sink to clean up. “How’s that feel?”

“Wow. Good. Amazing! Like no pain at all. And not even that, it’s like I feel… stronger! This is really good.” Brian rushed to get his shoe back on. “Let’s go play some ball!”

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 05

Everyday after school on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, Julian helped out Mr. Cohen, the science teacher, in the lab. A number of animals and class pets were kept there. The class had two hamsters named, Lucky and Sandy, and also three turtles and a new garter snake. Just this month, they were having a contest to see who could come up with the best name for the snake. Whenever it was Julian's turn to come into the lab, he would help clean out the hamster cages, changing out the litter and refilling the water bottles as necessary. He helped to feed the other animals too. Julian was good at it. He had a natural knack, Mr. Cohen had told him. There seemed to be an air of peace and calm that seemed to emanate from his presence, and it kept the animals quiet.

Julian didn't know much about that. He just liked to play with them.

Today, after he shot a few hoops with his all-better ankle, Brian decided to join his friend and they trotted out to the lab together. When they got there, they found Mr. Cohen bent over one of the hamster cages, poking his nose through the bars and observing the resident therein.

Julian slipped the bag from his shoulder and let it fall off to one side. "So, how's Lucky doing?"

Over the last month, it became obvious that Lucky was sick. There was this hard lump growing out from the side of his belly. Well, he was getting on three years old, Mr. Cohen had said. It was probably just his time.

"He's about the same," said Mr. Cohen. "Not eating very much. Not moving around much at all. You want to hold him?" He glanced from one boy to the next.

Brian smiled and backed away.

Julian stepped up. Reaching in, he fished the little guy out, just one big ball of fur it seemed, all twitches and whiskers. He pet him a few times. "Isn't there anything we can do, Mr. Cohen?"

The science teacher shook his head. "Not unless you know how to cure cancer." He smiled. He ruffled Julian's hair. "Or maybe you do but you'd forgotten to bring it today?" He chuckled.

Brian's eyes went wide for a second. He rotated around so he had his back to the teacher. He made eyes at Julian.

Julian smiled and tried to shush Brian at the same time. He aimed his eyes toward the other end of the room, at the blackboard.

"Oh!" Brian took hold of Mr. Cohen's arm. "I just remembered! There is this...um...this...question, yes question! That...uh...I wanted to ask you about..."

Mr. Cohen bent his head and raised one eyebrow. "Like a...science question?"

"Yeah...that's it! A science question..." Brian began leading the teacher away from the cages and toward the blackboard.

As the other two moved away, Julian put the hamster back in its cage. He reached into his pocket and fished out the plastic bag with the twig in it. He made up some paste with water from the sink nearby. Retrieving the hamster from the cage, he applied the medicine to the animal's belly where the big bump was. All during this process, he kept his eyes on the other two at the blackboard end of the room and how their conversation was going.

Mr. Cohen pivoted and called out to Julian. "Aren't you done with Lucky's cage yet?" The teacher and Brian were finally making their way back over from the blackboard. Mr. Cohen had finished answering Brian's question, and just about every other question that Brian could think of, related to science and otherwise.

"Oh, yeah!" Julian hurried and placed the gooped up hamster back in its cage after he lathered on the last bit of the medicine. He tucked the creature back inside its wee ceramic house just to be sure.

Mr. Cohen bent and inspected the cage. "Where is he?"

Julian smiled widely. "He's resting." He pointed to the house.

The two boys hustled through the rest of their chores after that while Mr. Cohen went back to grading his papers. Though the boys' hands were busy, they kept a lookout all the while, just in case they needed to distract Mr. Cohen again because just now, the ceramic house had started to glow, like Lucky was watching TV inside.

Nearing the end of the clean-up session, Mr. Cohen came around and clapped his arms on the boys' shoulders. "So everything going okay at school? How're the bullies treating you?"

"We're fine!" The boys chimed in together. They grinned and showed all their teeth. Normally, Julian would have appreciated the attention. Mr. Cohen was a kind man and genuinely cared about them. This he knew. Today, however, he couldn't keep his eyes from darting back to the hamster cage every other second.

There came a knock at the door. A familiar face peered inside. "Julian?" It was Nicole.

Julian spun around to face the teacher. "Oh, I'm sorry, Mr. Cohen! I almost forgot! I have this project I gotta do..."

"Oh right!" cried Brian. "Yeah...that...uh...project thing! Sorry, we gotta go!"

Mr. Cohen straightened up. He crossed his arms on his chest. "Is that right?"

"Yeah, sorry!" Julian gathered his things off the floor. "We gotta go! And thanks for answering his questions! And...see ya!"

They darted up to the door, and seizing Nicole by the hand, they rushed out into the hallway, leaving a frowning Mr. Cohen behind, reaching his hand up and scratching his head.

~~~

By the time the three had gone down the stairs and back onto the ground floor, they had slowed to a walk and Brian and Julian had finally let go of Nicole's hands. Julian did happen to hold it for just a little longer than necessary, but he didn't think she noticed.

"So what were we running for?" She brushed a stray lock of hair from her face.

By the time the three had gone down the stairs and back onto the ground floor, they had slowed to a walk and Brian and Julian had finally let go of Nicole's hands. Julian did happen to hold it for just a little longer than necessary, but he didn't think she noticed.

"So what were we running for?" She brushed a stray lock of hair from her face. "Oh!" Brian zipped over to Julian's side and gave him an elbow jab. He coughed. "Right now's no good for me. I have to go home right away, and..."

Julian turned to him. "But..."

"I know!" Brian's eyes brightened. "Why don't the two of you go off to the library without me, and I'll catch up on what you got tomorrow and we'll go from there?"

"But..."

Brian pulled Julian close. "This time, you really owe me one, big guy." He slapped his buddy on the shoulder and headed down the hall before Julian could stop him. "I'll see you two tomorrow!" As he turned around and sped away he added just barely loud enough for them to hear, "Behave...!"

Julian turned to Nicole. He smiled and shrugged his shoulders. He motioned in the direction of the library. "Shall we?"

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 06

The health project wasn't much of a challenge for Julian, what with recent events and all the medical information that he had been reading over the last few days.

He knew most of that stuff already. In fact, he found he was teaching most of it to Nicole as he went along. She was impressed.

"Wow," she said, "you know this stuff pretty good. Is somebody in your family a doctor or something?"

"I have a good friend who is." He adjusted his glasses.

The two had finished with the library and were now picking their way back to her locker on the second floor.

Julian was nodding. "Yeah, he's really smart. I've known him all my life. When it comes to medicine and problems with the human body, he's got an answer for everything."

She chuckled. "Well, does he have an answer for acne?" Right away, she regretted saying it. Her hand flew to her chin, covering it. "Don't look!"

They stopped. They were already at her locker.

Julian frowned. "What?"

She was still covering her chin with her hand. She shook her head.

Julian smiled. He let out a breath. How Nicole could ever be ashamed of how she looked, he would never understand in a million years. Reaching up, he took her hand and tried to ease it away. "Now, let me see..."

At first she didn't move. But then she let fall her gaze. Sighing, she dropped her hand and lifted her chin. "You're not allowed to laugh."

He edged in closer. He saw it. It wasn't big, but there was a pimple sitting just beneath the tip of her chin. It was red and swollen and had a white spot in the middle of it.

He reached into his pocket and whipped out the plastic bag. Dashing over to the drinking fountain, he made up some of the paste like he did before. He eased in close to her again, and then he reached up with his finger and went to apply the medicine to the lesion.

Nicole pulled back. "What are you doing? What is that?"

"Just trust me on this." He reached out with the mixture and applied a dab to the zit under her chin. He stood back.

It morphed as he watched. It glowed. His eyes widened at the same speed that the zit itself shrivelled and pruned.

And then it was gone.

Nicole frowned. She reached up and touched her chin. Rushing to her locker, she opened it. There was a mirror on the door. She bent and peered into it. "Oh my G...!" Her eyes went wide. "Where did it go?" She whipped around to face him He drew back a step. He smiled. "I told you..."

She grabbed his hand. "Now do my forehead!"

He glanced down. He regarded her hand. It was wound tight like a watch over his. He looked up. She dropped her gaze and then let go of his hand. "Do my forehead." She lifted her bangs away and showed him what she hadn't even shown her parents for the last two years.

Her forehead wasn't bad. And it had no huge, single lesions like the one that had been on her chin. It was just a little rough in patches, somewhat dry and scaling here and there, and bumpy.

He smiled. He reached up and smoothed the salve onto it, just a thin layer. As he watched, the bumps flattened out and the redness faded. Erased. Like they had never been.

She giggled as she checked herself out in the mirror. "It itches." She touched her forehead. It was smooth. Like magazine smooth. "Wow. And it's warm."

Julian's heart was racing, and he couldn't tell if it was the healing process again or not. He had never had a chance to be this close to her. Never spoken this

number of words to her all in one sitting or even through all the years they've known each other. She was even more beautiful close up than from a distance.

Outside, the night had come. The moon was in the window by the end of the hallway and it was on her hair, her face, her everything. Soon, the janitor will be making his rounds and they will have to be gone. He wished that moment would never come. Nicole was still admiring her skin in the mirror. From this angle, her cheeks glowed in the moonlight, a faerie, a wil-o-the-wisp. He could see the swirls of blonde, baby fuzz on her neck, just under her ears. She had dimples when she smiled. She was saying something but her words were music and they drifted over his head and wound themselves around him in a dance. Her fragrance was in the air, and in his face, and in his nose. He shuddered. He had read about pheromones on the computer too, and now in that moment, they worked on him and he wondered that he was still able to stand. He flushed. The lights went out.

Nicole gasped. They reached out and held hands.

"What happened?" Nicole asked.

"I don't know." Julian helped her to gather her things and close up her locker.

"We should go." They held hands for the few minutes until they got outside the school again. The warmth of it, though, he held for a long time after that.

He walked her home. He had always known where she lived. It was out of his way, but he didn't mind. And she knew that too but she didn't say anything.

Now they stood in front of her house. He waved and went to leave.

She watched him go but then called out. "Isn't your house that way?"

He stopped. "Yeah, but I have to go somewhere first."

"Where?"

"Just...somewhere. I'll see ya!" He turned and raced off.

~~~

He made his way over to the house, another three blocks over from where he had been. It was a group home, for the mentally unstable. But not so unstable they had to stay locked up against their will. Here, it was entirely voluntary and they could leave if they had really wanted to go.

Julian peered over at it from across the street. There was a bench there and he sat down.

Maybe he should just go in. Maybe he would be glad to see him this time.

Maybe this time, things will be different. Maybe.

Planting his hands on his knees, he hoisted himself up. He marched up to the back door. He punched in the combination. He made his way up to the nursing station.

"Hey, Julian!" A tall man, dressed in uniform white strode up to him and shook his hand.

Julian smiled. "Hey, Joe. Did you get my message? How's my father?"

Joe shook his head. "He's had a bad day. He's in bed already."

Julian played with the button on his coat. "Do you think I could see him? I just wanted to..."

"No." Joe winced. "I'm so sorry, Julian. I don't think that's a good idea. He's had a bad day. The voices have been non-stop, even with the higher dosage. I am so sorry..."

"It'll only take a second." He fingered the twig in his pocket.

"I'm sorry, Julian. And you remember what the doctor said last time. It would just upset him."

Julian gazed deeper into Joe's eyes. "It's important, Joe. And it would only take a second."

Joe sighed. "I'm sorry, Julian. I just can't."

They stood still, the two of them, each searching into the other's eyes.

Joe was a good man. He was kind to all the patients and also to Julian, in particular. He never tired of the boy's questions. He always relayed messages as best he could, and always stayed on top of his father's condition.

"Maybe next time?" Joe placed a hand on Julian's shoulder. "And the minute that the doctors allow it, I will call you. I promise."

Julian looked down. He nodded. Dropping his shoulders, he turned and went down the stairs. At the door, he craned his neck back and looked up. Joe was still there. The man waved and smiled. Julian dropped his gaze, opened the door and drifted back out into the cold and drifting snow of the night.

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 07

The next morning, when Julian got to school, it was Brian’s turn to be busy trying to hunt down his friend. When he did, Brian launched himself at Julian and clasped him by the shoulders. He muscled him to one side of the hallway. He whispered into his ear. “Julian, you have to do that thing again.”

Julian eased Brian’s hands off him. “What?”

Brian rolled his eyes. “You put the stuff on my left leg yesterday and…”

“Yeah, so? Does it feel bad? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing!” Brian smiled. “No, it’s not like there’s something wrong, it’s just…”

“What?”

Brian laughed. “You have no idea! It’s like a brand new leg! When I go to jump with my left leg, it’s like I can jump a whole foot higher!”

Julian smiled. “Well, that’s good then.” “No, but I’m not…balanced…”

“Oh, right!” Julian frowned. “Well, I guess we have to do the other one. Maybe later at lunch…”

“No, but I got a better idea!”

“What?” He furrowed his brows. “You mean like your arms too?”

“Ha! No!” Brian stopped and checked himself. Then he glanced to his left and right. He leaned in closer to his friend. “No, I mean we should do this for the whole team! Well…maybe not Bobby.”

Julian shook his head. “No, I don’t think that’s such a great idea…”

“What do you mean? Can you imagine how we’re going to win? We’d be better than all the other teams!”

“Whatever happened to keeping it a secret? Or else the government’s going to come?”

“Well, it’d still be a secret. A secret among the team.”

“No…”

“Why are you being so selfish about this?” Brian stepped back. He regarded his friend. “It isn’t even really yours! You don’t know how you got it. Not exactly!

For all we know, I could’ve found it in my bag…” He planted his hands on his hips.

Julian took a few steps back. He began to frown and shake his head. Turning, he strode down the hallway and began to disappear among the morning crowd, wading off toward their homerooms.

“Hey!” Brian shouted to his friend but didn’t go after him.

All day that day, Julian couldn’t concentrate. He avoided everybody at lunch.

Finding some little used stairwell, he sat down and began to eat his sandwich alone. He thought about it and couldn’t help but wonder what his neighbor Daniel would do in a situation like this. Or even what his science teacher, Mr. Cohen would do.

By his side, a row of ants was passing by. They were orderly, one following the next, each holding up a breadcrumb about twice the size of its own body. Then one of them came along, and tried to pick up a piece that was nearly four times as heavy as the other ones. Its feelers and legs twitched but it couldn’t lift the tiny piece of bread. Then another ant came, and then another one, and it was only when the three of them worked together that the piece was finally hoisted off the ground and began making its way across the step that Julian was sitting on. Julian shook his head. He broke off another half a dozen crumbs from his sandwich and left them on the step on purpose, right by the ants. He sighed. Let’s face it. He was just a little kid. Everybody always told him so. He was only in Grade Eight! This problem was much bigger than he was. What was he supposed to do?

~~~

After school, he tried to slink away through a door he didn’t tend to use a lot.

“Hey, Julian!” Nicole came sailing down the stairs, smiling.

Julian smiled back. “Hi.”

“Are you going home already?”

Julian nodded. They left together.

By the time they got to the park, Julian finally noticed. “Hey, this isn’t on your way home.”

Nicole nodded. “Um…that’s okay. I can walk this way a bit.” She fiddled with her hair. “So, where’s Brian?”

“I don’t know.”

They continued down the path, a cobbled stoned affair with wide gaps between the rocks. Frozen leaves lined the walkway here and there, and filled some of the gaps also. A thick slab of snow covered the fields on either side, with footprints of squirrels running through and across the surface. Dotting the length of the path at certain points were streetlamps and then a bench beneath it to sit on. Just now, there were only a few stragglers on the walk and going home from school, like Nicole and Julian were doing, beneath a sky that had darkened early because it was February.

Nicole cleared her throat. “Um…actually…Julian…”

“Yeah?”

Nicole bit her lip. “You remember what happened yesterday…”

He nodded. “Uh huh.” He frowned. “Which part?”

“Well, I was going to ask…” She chuckled. “…this is kind of hard to say…”

They stopped walking. Nicole stood beneath the streetlamp, hair again all aglow. She reached out to touch it. “Um…”

“Hey!”

They turned toward the voice.

It was Brian. He was running over to them from down the path. “Wait up!”

Julian rolled his eyes. “Oh no…”

Brian slowed to a walk when he got close. “So, uh…” He turned to Nicole. “Hi!”

She smiled. “Hi!” She turned back to Julian.

Julian was working at a patch of snow by his feet.

Brian sighed. “Julian, can we go talk somewhere?”

Julian glanced up at him. Then at Nicole. “We can talk here.”

Brian shook his head. “I mean…well…it’s…it’s about the thing.”

“We can talk about the thing here.”

“No…!” Brian gave him a look and indicated the… ‘other woman’. “I mean…”

“That’s okay.” Julian shrugged. “She knows about the thing.”

Brian spun on her. “You do?!” He spun on Julian. “She does?!”

Julian nodded.

Nicole nodded. “I do.”

“You do?!” Brian’s jaw dropped. “But…but…” He strode up and took his friend by the shoulders. “But I’m your best friend! We’ve known each other since… since…since we were in diapers!”

“So?” He shook off Brian’s hands and stepped back.

“I’ve seen you naked!”

“So what?” Julian frowned.

Brian scoffed. “So…”

Julian scrunched his nose. “And that’s kind of weird, by the way…”

Brian jabbed a finger at Nicole. “So, she’s just a girl!”

Nicole planted her hands on her hips. “Hey!”

“And I’m your best friend!” Brian shouted.

Julian backed away another few steps. He crossed his arms. “And so what if you’re my best friend? You’re still just somebody who can only think of himself and what he wants…”

“Hey, now that’s not true! I was thinking of the team…”

“But the team isn’t even sick! This is for helping people! Like sick people! It’s for bigger things, not…”

Nicole laughed. She pointed at Brian. “You were going to take the thing and use it on your stupid basketball team?”

Brian glared at her. “You stay out of this! This has nothing to do with you!”

“Oh!” Nicole crossed her arms. “And how does it have anything to do with you?

It’s not yours!”

“And it’s not yours either!” Brian turned to Julian. “Tell her!”

Julian frowned at Nicole. He took a step toward her. “What were you going to ask me earlier?”

“Well…I…”

“What?”

She chewed her lip. “…it’s not important…”

He glared at her. “What?”

She glared back for a second, but then dropped her gaze. She cleared her throat. “I was going to…earlier…ask…” She swallowed. “…I have this birthmark…”

“You see?!” Brian jabbed a finger at her. He laughed. He clapped his hands together. “It’s not just me! She’s the same! We are all the same…” He turned to face her. “…just a stupid birthmark she wants to fix so little Miss Perfect can be even more perfect…”

“You, shut up!” Nicole shouted and you could see her breath in the cold.

Julian shook his head. He bit down. “You two disgust me…” Spinning around, he began trudging through the snow and down the path toward the far side of the park.

Brian called after him. “Oh, right! Mr. Red-eyed Monster. Don’t act like you’re so much better than us! You’re just like us! I know what you’re saving it for…”

From twenty yards down the path, Julian froze. He spun around.

Brian smirked. “You think I don’t know? You’re just as selfish and bad as the rest of us.”

Julian shook his head. “Don’t…”

“You think you’re so noble? You’re not out to save the world either. You just want to use it to make your own little, miserable life better. Well, let me tell you something. Sprained ankles are one thing, but I bet…”

Julian began stomping back.

“…even that lousy twig in your pocket…”

Julian sped up.

“…coud never ever heal OCD!”

Julian launched himself at Brian. “Argh!”

“Julian!” Nicole shouted.

Julian crashed into Brian and the two tumbled to the ground. They fought. They tussled. Nicole tried to pull them apart but she couldn’t. Another two minutes, and Julian managed to set himself on top of Brian and pin his hands down to the ground. They were now both cold and wet and covered in snow.

“Get off!” Brian tried to spit at him but Julian turned his head. “Get off!”

“Stop it, the both of you!”

“Yeah!” Brian shouted. “Listen to your girlfriend you…”

Lifting one hand, Julian slapped Brian across the face. Then he seized him by the front of his coat. “How many times have I told you?! It’s not OCD, jerk for brains!” He jumped to his feet. “It’s schizophrenia!” Kicking one last bit of snow onto Brian, Julian whipped around and marched away.

Nicole watched him go. She bent down to Brian, still half lying on the ground.

He was just sitting up and wiping a bit of blood from a cut lip.

“You all right?” She helped him up.

“Yeah.” He brushed himself off.

She brushed him off a couple of times too. “So, who has OCD?”

Brian spun on her. “It’s schizophrenia, jerk for brains!”

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 08

Julian marched until he was out of breath. He slowed down and then stopped.

He peered over his shoulder. No, he couldn’t see them anymore. He had turned the corner. He eased over to a bench nearby and sat down. He rubbed his chest. He couldn’t see beneath his coat, but he was sure that Brian had landed a good one and a bruise will be there some time later this evening.

“Isn’t it strange how good friends must always argue sometimes?”

Julian turned the other way. A man had stepped up while he wasn’t looking.

“How are you, young man?” He indicated the bench. “May I?”

Julian glanced at the bench. Then at the man. He nodded. The man moved to sit down.

An old man. The stranger who had joined Julian was old and had a face that was a piece of work in ancient leather, darkened and worn. He wore a hat and a beard that flowed down to this chest like a wizened wizard. He moved slowly and with purpose, but had a cane for support. He grunted a little when he sat down beside the boy. Julian shifted over to make room.

“Thank you! My, my…” The man reached up and brushed off the snow from his shoulders.

Julian furrowed his brows. The man seemed familiar somehow. “I’m sorry, sir, but do I know you?”

“No, no!” The man chuckled. “Of course not! I just happened to be passing by, going about on my evening walk, you know?” He snorted. “And I happened to see the lot of you, over there…” He pointed back the way Julian had come. “… shouting about something, but then, I really couldn’t make it out.” He leaned in closer. “What were you fighting about anyway?”

Julian knitted his brows. “Nothing. Nothing to talk about.”

“Ah, of course! Probably nothing important…”

Julian stood up. “Well…it was nice meeting you…”

“Oh, but wait!” He touched Julian on the sleeve and made him sit down again.

“It’s just that…well…” He extended his hand. “I am professor Will…” He cleared his throat. “…William, by the way, and very nice to meet you.” They shook hands.

“But…” Julian indicated the way home.

“Oh, but to tell you the truth, I am fairly new in town. I wonder if I could impose and ask of your assistance?” He smiled.

Julian paused. He swallowed and then nodded.

“Well, you see? I am actually only a visitor here. I’ve come with the recent exhibit in the museum.” The man took his cane and cleaned off some of the snow that had collected on his shoes.

“The museum?”

“Yes! But you see, there has been quite a tragedy down there, as we’ve lost something. Something terribly precious to us…”

“Oh?” Julian frowned. “What did you lose?”

The professor turned to him and smiled. “Now, you wouldn’t believe that I was actually at liberty to tell you? That’s highly classified information, my young friend!” He tossed his head back and laughed.

“Well…” Julian adjusted his glasses.

The professor settled down. “Suffice it to say…” He cleared his throat. “…that the object in question is very powerful but also very dangerous and should be returned immediately…”

“Dangerous?”

“Yes.” The professor nodded, frowning. “Although I’m sure this means nothing to you, but if you were to know what I’m talking about, which you don’t, you’d know that in using this artefact, there is always some drainage of energy from the user. That is how it is dangerous. Though, in the right hands, wielded by an experienced user, such as yours truly…” He tipped his hat. “…the process might be reversed. And energy, all energy in the universe is laid out before you for the taking, that it might be gathered instead of expended…” Closing his fist, he lifted his head to the night sky and for a moment, Julian could swear the old man’s eyes glowed.

Julian raised one eyebrow. “Um…it’s professor…”

The old man turned back to him. “William.”

“…William, then. And you work with the museum?”

“Yes.”

“Like an archaeology professor? With the exhibits?”

“That’s what I said, wasn’t it?” He frowned.

Julian coughed. “I’m sorry, professor, but do you happen to have any ID with you?”

The professor’s eyes shot wide. “Why, young man! How impertinent!” He huffed and sat up straight. “I’ll have you know, I am a top authority when it comes to all things archaeological, only a handful of men in the world who can say they have been to all the important digs in Europe in nearly fifty years…the nerve!” The man actually looked hurt.

Julian scratched his head. “Well, I’m sorry but…”

The professor was instantly better. “Oh, that’s all right!” He beamed. He drew in closer. “Now, I know for a fact that you and your classmates were in the museum and in the general area on the day and at the time that the object was lost…”

“Really?”

He drew in closer still. “…did you see anything?”

The professor had pointed his right eye at Julian, like he was out to hypnotize him. And it almost seemed to work, except the professor smelled funny, stale, like an old crypt.

Julian shook his head and jerked away. “Uh…no!” He shifted further away down the bench. “And why are you asking me, anyway? If you’ve lost something, shouldn’t you be talking to the police? Or museum security?”

The professor rolled his eyes. “Of course!” He scoffed. “Of course, I’ve done that already! But they were of no help. That’s why I decided to strike out on my own, hoping to recover it through irregular channels. Now…” He slid over again.

“…tell me. You must have seen something…” The professor smiled and his eyes squinted until they vanished.

Julian’s eyes widened. He moved back. “Oh, no! Really, professor! I mean it! I am so sorry but I don’t think I can help you…” Julian bounced to his feet, spun around and ran off toward home. He checked over his shoulder several times, just to make sure the old man didn’t get up to follow him.

He didn’t need to worry. The professor remained sitting on the bench until he was long gone. The old man clasped the top of his cane in both hands and placed it squarely in front of himself. He reached up and began to stroke his beard. He frowned. “Well, so much for the easy way…”

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 09

When Julian got to school the next day, he found that he didn’t have to dial in the combination to his lock to open his locker. That was because the lock that had been on the door was not on the door at all. It was gone. The door was still closed, but the lock was missing. Julian reached up and swung the door open.

He peered inside. And there it was. The lock that he had left on the door when he went home last night, was now sitting inside the locker, but it had been pried

open and was now torn to pieces and useless. He rifled through his other things. Nope. Nothing seemed to be missing—all his books and binders were still there, and stacked exactly the way that he had left them last night.

Julian shut the door again. He frowned. Now, who would do something like that? And why? Why would anybody break open someone else’s locker and then not take anything from it?

Julian began wandering down the hall to the general office. He would need a new combination lock, that’s for sure. All the way there, he scratched his head and couldn’t understand it at all. He thought of Big Bobby, but on second thought, no. If it had been Big Bobby, his things would have been, at the very least, left strewn about the floor, or better yet, halfway flushed down the toilet in the boys’ room. Well, it was probably some other kids and their prank for no apparent reason. High School kids could be so weird. At least nothing went missing. There was that.

~~~

After school, Julian reported to the science lab as usual. It was Thursday.

He was barely through the door before Mr. Cohen called out to him. “Hey,

Julian! You won’t believe this!” Mr. Cohen raced over and took the boy by the shoulders. Rushing him over to the hamster cage, he stopped and pointed.

“Look!”

Julian examined the cage. And there inside his little domain, Lucky, the previously terminal hamster, was now no longer terminal and scurrying from one end of the cage to the other, busy in his normal, scavenging behaviour. He looked wonderfully happy, with no sign of fatigue or tiredness anymore, and definitely no sign of the huge tumour that had been jutting out of his left side only a few days ago.

“Can you believe it?” Mr. Cohen was all smiles. “I can hardly believe it myself!

How do you think that could have happened?”

Julian smiled back. He shook his head. “I don’t know…I really don’t…”

The teacher put his arm around Julian’s shoulders. “…it’s like a miracle…”

Julian turned and peered up into Mr. Cohen’s face. He adjusted his glasses.

“Sir, do you believe in miracles?”

Mr. Cohen furrowed his forehead. “Miracles? You mean, like what happened here? Like miraculous healing?”

“Yeah. Like that there might actually be something like that in the world. Like magic potions and stuff.”

Mr. Cohen shrugged. “I don’t really believe it myself, but I know the idea of magical healing and healing powers, in special herbs and plants and other things is very common. In fact, this notion of healing and long life is quite an ancient belief. It’s been around for a long, long time.” He planted one hand on his hip and reached up with the other one to scratch his head. “I remember reading some articles on the subject a while back, just curious, you know? And a…” He began to sidestep toward his office at the back of the room. “… actually, why don’t we go and look it up now?”

Julian joined him and they headed to his desk. They eased aside the mountains of papers that Mr. Cohen had still to mark and dug out his laptop from the bottom. Mr. Cohen sat down in front of it in a swivel chair. Julian found another chair and planted himself beside his teacher. They woke the computer from sleep and brought up the browser on it. They searched under ‘tree of life’.

“You see?” Mr. Cohen pointed at the screen. “It’s actually quite a common theme across all kinds of people groups and cultures—in ancient Armenia,

Egypt, Assyria, even in traditional Judeo-Christian writings. The idea is that in the very beginning of things, along with creation, or even to the point that

all creation had at first sprung forth from one original tree of life. And this first tree of life was able and continues to bring healing and sometimes immortality to those who understood how to use it.”

Julian read through parts of the article. He tilted his head. “But how would you use something like that?”

“I don’t know.” The teacher peered closer into the screen. “I suppose you would have to apply some part of the tree directly to the illness, like maybe a branch or root, or maybe you could eat of its fruit or drink its sap. Different cultures will have different things to say about that, I’m sure.”

Julian turned to face him. “So, some people really believe that the tree exists.

Even today?”

“Oh, people will believe in anything! Tree of life, fountain of youth! And certainly, there are still plenty of people searching out there. Just look at this…” Mr.

Cohen clicked through a couple of links. “Now this,” he pointed at the screen, “this is the most recent archaeological dig on something like that. This is

Germany, a city called Fritzlar in the state of Hesse. According to legend, there used to be a village near there called ‘Geismar’, and it is believed that back in the year 723 AD or thereabout, there used to be a huge oak tree in Geismar called, the Donar Oak, which means Thor’s Oak. The people in the village back then honestly believed that the tree was grown from a seedling from the original tree of life, and was well known to cure diseases and even brought a man back to life once from the dead.”

Julian nodded.

Mr. Cohen’s eyes widened after he clicked through a few more links. “Huh! How about that? It says here that just last week, some of the artefacts from this very dig were touring through here and were exhibited down at the museum where your class had visited.” He turned to face Julian. “Do you remember seeing it?

Maybe your tour guide brought you by and you saw it?”

Julian smiled. He shook his head. “I don’t know…we saw so many things that day…” He wiped his hand across his forehead.

Mr. Cohen rubbed his hand on his chin. “Wow. Can you imagine if something like that actually worked? Can you imagine?”

Julian nodded. “Yeah. I can, actually.”

For a few minutes, Mr. Cohen went on and read a few more articles on the computer, mostly about healing and archaeology, and continued to tell Julian all about them, like he was teaching a class. Julian hardly caught any of it. He was thinking about something else and was just nodding along.

Julian looked up. “Sir?”

Mr. Cohen stopped short. “Yes?”

“If you had the ability to cure all diseases, what would you do?”

“Oh. Well…” The teacher sat back. He rubbed his chin. “…I suppose…I suppose I would probably try my best to spend my time wisely, and work as hard as I can to bring healing to as many people as I possibly can.”

Julian nodded. “Yeah, but does that mean you’d hand over the cure to the authorities? Like the police? Can you trust them?”

“The police?” Mr. Cohen was still playing with the computer as he considered.

He was scrolling the page up and down with the mouse, looking at nothing in particular. “Well…I suppose you must think about it, and then…”

“Stop!” Julian shot out his hand and stopped him.

Mr. Cohen turned to his student. “What?”

Julian pointed at the screen. “Who’s that?”

On the screen was a picture of a man. An older man. He had dark skin and a flowing white beard.

Mr. Cohen read from the screen. “Says here, he’s some kind of archaeologist.

But he was arrested a year ago for stealing some artefacts from a dig his colleagues had been working on…and then before that…falsification of data… hmmm…wow!” He turned to Julian. “This is one bad dude. I mean, for a guy with a lot of education and a PhD to boot, he was not the most upright of scholars, if you know what I mean.”

“Does it say where he is now?”

Mr. Cohen scanned the fine print again. “Nope. Just says that, um, ‘…the disgraced professor of archaeology has been officially banned from most well known dig sites and also most museums.’ Well, I guess that’s to be expected for this…a…Dr. Willibald.”

“Willi- what?”

“Willibald.”

Julian eased his chair back. He rose to his feet, still staring at the screen. “He told me it was William…”

“What? William…what?”

Julian spun around to his teacher. “I’m sorry, Mr. Cohen! I can’t stay today! I just remembered a thing…uh…an emergency!”

“Julian?”

“Sorry I can’t help today! Bye!” Julian raced out of the room and into the hall.

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 10

Julian raced home. On coming up to his building, he noticed that there was a police cruiser parked outside, which was nothing special really, given the neighbourhood. But when he walked into his apartment, he found that the police officer from the cruiser downstairs was sitting right there at his kitchen table, talking to his mom.

“Julian, this is officer Donnelly.” She indicated the officer.

Julian said hi.

His mom went on to tell him that their apartment had been broken into while the two of them were out. Things were messed up a bit, especially in Julian’s room, and a little cash was stolen, but all in all, it could have been a lot worse. They could have been home. Anyway, after checking out the apartment, the officer thought it was probably just a random burglary.

Yeah, right, Julian added to himself.

The intercom at the front door beeped. Julian went and got it. It was Brian. “Hey is it Julian?”

Julian called out into the kitchen. “Mom, I gotta go downstairs…” He zipped out of the apartment.

His mom stood up from the table. “Julian!” But he had gone already.

~~~

Downstairs, in the lobby, he found Brian waiting for him. And Nicole too.

Julian walked up to them. “Hey you guys, I have to tell you…”

“Julian,” Nicole interrupted him. “Just listen, okay? The two of us have been talking about it all day and…”

Julian shook his head. “No, wait…”

“…no, Julian, really, we…”

“But…”

Brian joined in. “We just wanted to say sorry and that…”

“No, but…”

“Julian!” Nicole stomped her foot. “Can’t you just be a gentleman about this?

We said we were sorry!”

“Yeah!” Brian chimed in. “What more do you want?”

“Yeah,” said Nicole. “And jerk for brains here…” She thumbed at Brian.

“Hey!” Brian glared at her.

“Stop it!” Julian held his hands up. The other two stopped. Julian let out a breath. “My apartment was broken into.”

“What? Really?” Nicole’s eyes widened. “Is everything all right? Was your mom hurt?”

Julian shook his head. He took his friends by the arms. “No, just listen! Listen to me…” He pulled them in closer. “…this is very serious. I think we’re all in real danger.”

Brian squirmed out of his grasp. “What are you talking about?”

Julian told them. He told the two of them about what he had found out with Mr.

Cohen at the lab, on the computer and what he thought the thing really was. He also told them about Professor Willibald in the park and how his own locker at school was broken into and now his apartment too.

“So, you think it was him?” Brian furrowed his brows.

Nicole nodded. “It’s got to be him. It all fits…”

Julian nodded. “…and he must know I have it…”

Nicole’s eyes widened. “…and he must want it back and that’s why he’s broken into your locker and your apartment…”

Brian took his friend by the arm. “We have to tell your mom…no! We have to go tell the police…”

Julian stepped back. “What ever happened to ‘don’t tell anyone’? And ‘they’ll

take it from you’ and all that?”

“Well, so what? So what if they take it from you? If you don’t have it anymore, he’ll stop coming after you!”

“But…” Julian looked to Nicole.

Nicole nodded. “I’m afraid I’ll have to agree with j…”

Brian ignored the implication. “Is this worth getting hurt over? You should go to the police and give them the thing. I mean, who knows what the old guy is capable of?”

Julian turned and began to pace. “I don’t know, I…” He held his head with his hands.

“You don’t have a choice, Julian!”

“But…”

“But what?” Brian strode up and took his friend by the shoulder.

“…there’s…there’s something I need to do first…”

Nicole raised her hands. “Like what?”

“Julian!” another voice called.

They all spun around toward the elevator. It was Julian’s mother. She was holding the door open and calling out to him. “Julian, the officer needs to talk to you.”

Julian turned to his friends. “Listen. Just go home first. I’ll text you two later tonight.” He started backing away. “But…”

“Julian!” His mom called again.

“Just…go! All right?” Julian spun around and jogged back toward the elevator.

~~~

That night, Julian waited until well past 2 am, after he was sure his mom had fallen asleep.

He sent out a message to the other two. “You guys awake?”

“Yup,” came the replies.

His fingers blurred over the keys. “Meet me out in the alley behind my apartment in ten.”

Ten later, the two boys stood in the cold, in the snow, behind Julian’s building, stomping their feet.

“Where is she?” Brian blew into his icicles for hands.

“How should I know?”

“She’s your girlfriend.”

“She’s not my girlfriend!” Julian adjusted his glasses.

Brian talked into his gloves calmly. Straight face. “She so is…”

Julian slapped him on the arm. “Don’t say that!”

“She sooo…”

“Stop…” Julian checked down the alley. “…here she comes!”

Nicole trotted up to them.

Brian crossed his arms and faced the newcomer. “And where were you?”

Nicole coughed. “I was brushing my hair.”

Brian’s jaw dropped. “You, what?!”

Julian rolled his eyes. “Come on, you two.” He began stamping down the alley.

“Hey, this is not the way to the police station.”

“I know. I have to go do something first.”

“Like what? We have to…”

The three froze.

Up ahead, in the distance, beneath the glare of the street lamp and amid blowing snow, stood alone figure in an overcoat, leaning on a cane. The man had dark skin and a flowing white beard.

“Master Julian. I have been waiting for you.”

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 11

The children began edging back. The professor was about thirty yards away.

Julian reached up and adjusted his glasses. “It was you, wasn’t it? My locker?

My house?”

The professor sneered. He reached out his hand. “Give it to me.” He began walking toward them, limping on his cane.

“Then it was you!” Julian continued to step backward. Turning his head, he whispered to his friends. “Get ready you guys. On the count of three…”

The other two leaned in close. “What?”

“Stop where you are.” The professor reached into his pocket and brought out a gun, with a silencer on the tip.

The three stopped.

“I wouldn’t try anything heroic, if I were you.” The professor continued to approach. Twenty yards. Nicole tugged Julian on the sleeve. “What now?!”

Julian kept his eyes on the professor. “Like I said. On the count of three…”

“But he’s got a gun!” said Brian.

“There are three of us. He can’t shoot us all…”

“But…”

The professor pointed his gun at them as he came closer. Ten yards. “I will not ask again. Give it to me.”

“Three!” Julian cried.

The three took off.

Down the alley, away from the professor.

A shot whizzed out. Classic sound from a silencer.

Nicole squealed.

Another shot.

Brian squealed too. A ricochet off the wall by Julian’s head.

They took the first turn between two buildings. Another zip from the silencer.

Another ricochet.

They took another turn down the next alley. They kept running.

Julian was whipping his head around and checking behind him. “I can’t see him! Can you guys see him?”

“No, I don’t think he’s there!”

They kept running and didn’t slow down. They zigzagged between the buildings in the area, taking every turn that became available to them as they ran. Finally, after a dozen or more zigs, and just as many zags, they exited the system of alleyways as they dashed out of the buildings in that neighbourhood and tore out into the open street. Coming up on a street lamp, they stopped for a second to catch their breath.

“What…” Brian gasped for breath. “…what the hell was that?”

Julian was huffing and puffing too. “What?”

“You said…you said…‘on the count…of three’…”

“What? I said…I said ‘three’…”

Nicole slapped Julian over the head. “…but you just—said—‘three’!”

“…you know…what I meant!” He rubbed his head.

Nicole yanked on Julian’s arm. “So, what do we do now? We gotta…”

Julian checked over his shoulder.

Shadows from the alley.

“Oh, no!” Julian pointed at the shadows.

“Oh, God!” shouted Brian.

“What do we do?” cried Nicole.

Stamping his feet, Julian searched this way and that.

His eyes brightened. “Come on!” Julian raced down the street. The other two followed.

Up ahead, beyond the first bend in the street, Julian had spotted a car by the side of the road. As they approached, they could see it was a cab. At the moment, the driver was sitting inside it and had the engine idling so the heat could stay on. Inside, he was reading the paper and eating a jelly doughnut at the same time. He must have been between shifts.

The kids rushed up to him and slammed up against his door. They were all over the window. “Please, sir! You have to help us!”

The cab driver buzzed down his window. “What?”

The kids all yapped away at once. “There’s a man…” “…he’s shooting…” “…a man…” “…He’s got a…” “…help us!”

The man held up his hand. “One at a time! One at a time!”

Julian motioned for the others to be quiet. “There’s a man. He’s after us. He’s got a gun!”

“What?! Well then you kids should call the police! What are you asking…”

The yapping resumed. All at once. Again. Only this time, there was a fourth voice in the mix too.

“Oh my God!” Julian screamed at the top of his lungs. The others stopped.

Julian bent down, picked up a wad of snow and whipped it at the driver through his open window.

It hit the cabby square in the face. “Why, you little…!” The man stormed out of his car and began chasing after Julian. Julian led him to about twenty yards away and then shouted over his shoulder.

“Get in the car!”

Nicole and Brian turned and glared at each other once, and then dove into the car, head first, through the door that the cab driver had conveniently left open.

Julian spun around and raced for the cab. The driver tried to catch up to him but he couldn’t. The driver was about five foot five and weighed two hundred and fifty pounds. One too many jelly doughnuts.

Nearing the car, Julian took a swan dive into the driver seat and crashed into

Brian, face first. Julian’s glasses went flying.

“Ow! You moron!” Brian’s hand flew to his forehead.

Julian blinked and rubbed his own forehead. “My glasses!”

“Shut the door! Shut the door!” Nicole screamed.

Julian reached behind and slammed the door shut. He pressed the button and closed the window. Just in time.

The driver crashed into the side of the car and the vehicle rocked.

Julian locked the doors. The driver screamed at the children. He yanked on the door handle but it wouldn’t budge. Pounding on the window, he screamed some more. Spit and doughnut bits were everywhere.

Nicole seized the front of Julian’s shirt. “What do we do now?”

“Somebody find my glasses!”

Brian wiggled toward the floor.

The driver was now fumbling around in his pockets for something, but shouting at them all the while.

Nicole pointed. “Look!”

Down the street, the professor was hobbling toward them, cane in one hand and his gun in the other.

Brian climbed out of the footwell to take a look. “Oh boy.”

The cabby was still planted by the driver’s door, spewing spit at them but they couldn’t make out the words anymore. He had gone back to banging on the window.

The professor approached. Finally noticing, the driver stopped shouting. He turned around to face the old man who was still some distance away. The driver measured the other man up and down as the newcomer waddled down the street toward him.

The driver saw the gun. “Hey, what are you doing with that?” he shouted.

The professor didn’t bother slowing down. He reached up. He fired one into the air.

Spinning around, the driver raced off down the street. No more shouting.

The professor strode right up to the front of the cab. He pointed the gun at the kids through the windshield. “Get out of the car.”

“What do we do?” Nicole kept her eyes in front and spoke out of the side of her mouth.

Julian spoke the same way to Brian. “You got my glasses?”

“No.”

Julian was still in the driver’s seat. Brian was on the far side with Nicole in the middle.

“We’ll have to switch places,” said Brian. “You can’t see.”

The professor outside rapped on the hood with his gun. “I said, get out!”

“There’s no time,” said Julian.

Brian spun to face him. “What?”

“Now!” cried the professor.

Julian floored it.

The back wheels spun.

The front of the cab bucked and knocked the old man to the side.

The back wheels caught. The car shot off.

Brian shut his eyes and held the dashboard tight. Nicole shut her eyes and held

Julian tight.

The car was picking up speed.

“Is he gone?!” cried Julian. “What happened?!”

Nicole opened her eyes.

The car jumped the curb. Lamp post coming. “Julian!”

“What?!”

“Brake!” Brian screamed.

Taking his foot off the gas, Julian stomped down on the brake with both feet.

The car skidded to a halt, throwing Nicole and Brian into the dashboard with a bang and a grunt. Julian took the steering wheel in the chest. The horn honked.

They looked up. The post was two feet away.

Recovering, the kids spun around in the seats and peered out the back of the car.

“Do you guys see him?” Julian squinted. “Where is he?”

Brian shoved something into Julian’s hand. “You were sitting on them.”

Julian held it up to his face. “My glasses!” He put them back on.

Nicole focused into the distance. “I don’t know! I don’t think he’s…”

A shot. The rear window—blown to bits.

“Still there!” cried Nicole.

“Hang on!” Julian put all his weight on the gas and the car tore off again, ripping out a chunk of the lamp post as it did so. With his glasses back on, Julian actually steered the car a little this time and they kept to the road.

Down the street they sped. Two more shots into the cab but they missed the children. Finally they rounded the curve, and then another three blocks after that, there were no more shots and they couldn’t see the professor anymore. Julian eased off on the gas and applied the brakes, only a little more gently this time.

Julian put the car into park. He checked the back again.

Brian joined him. “What do we do now?”

Nicole’s jaw dropped. “We go to the police, idiot!”

“No!” Opening the door, Julian slid out. He began trudging down the street. He didn’t look back.

The other two caught up to him and marched along by his side. “Where are you going?” asked Brian.

Julian stopped. “If you two want to go to the police, then just go first without me.”

The other two had stopped beside him. “You mean you’re not coming?” asked

Brian.

“I will! There’s just something I have to do first…”

“What?”

He glared at one friend and then the other. “Just go, will you?”

“But…”

“Just go!” Julian broke into a run and headed down the path through the park.

The other two turned and measured each other with their eyes. Turning as one, they raced off after him.

Down the path they ran, then out the far side of the park and onto the street.

Then another street, then another. After about four or five, Brian knew where his friend was headed.

“Where is he going?” asked Nicole as they ran behind Julian. “Do you know?”

“Yeah.” Brian nodded.

“Well, why…”

“Don’t worry, Nicole. I know why.”

Julian came up to the house and stopped. It was the group home. The one where Julian’s father was staying.

Brian and Nicole pulled up beside him. Brian drew in close. “What are you going to do now?”

“This way.” Julian led the way. “We’ll go in through the back.”

“But there’ll be nurses on duty…”

“I know that! Don’t you think…”

They stopped.

Rounding the back, they found that there was already someone there standing by the door. An old, bearded man with a gun.

The professor smiled. “I have an IQ of 200.”

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 12

“Now, now,” said the professor, “no more games, please. I am too old for games.” He waved his gun and ushered the three friends around so they faced

the other way. Now, the old man was positioned between them and the way out.

On the far side and behind the friends was a fence and then a brick wall thirty feet high. This time, they were trapped.

The old man smiled. “Give it to me.”

Nicole stepped up close behind Julian. “Julian…”

Julian motioned for her to be quiet. He spoke to the professor. “Fine, I’ll give it to you. But you have to let them go first.”

The professor chuckled. “Please, my little friend. Too much television.

Seriously.” He edged up to Brian and pinched him by the ear.

“Ow!” Brian shouted.

The professor didn’t let go. He dragged Brian by the ear until they were standing next to the wall, beneath the light near the back door, with about thirty feet between the two groups. He pointed the gun at Brian’s stomach.

He shot him.

Brian crumpled to the ground without a sound.

“Brian!” Julian made to go to him but he stopped when the old man pointed his gun at Nicole.

“No!” she cried.

Hobbling over and taking Nicole by the arm, the professor yanked her over to

the wall as well. He locked one arm around her neck. He levelled the gun into her ribs. “Now give it to me.”

“Julian…” Nicole began to cry.

Julian stood frozen. He blinked. Overhead, it started to snow and it was heavy, like Christmas.

The professor cocked the gun. “Now, please.”

Julian reached into his pocket and fished out the twig in the bag. He approached.

When Julian got close enough, the professor snatched the bag from Julian’s hand. He rapped the butt of the gun across Julian’s head and knocked him to the ground, bleeding. Julian’s glasses flew off into the bushes. Releasing his grip on Nicole, the old man shoved her aside and then added a boot into her back.

She tumbled off to the ground to land beside Brian, who hadn’t moved from the very first after he was shot. The two friends recovered somewhat and crawled up against Brian. Julian tested Brian’s breath and listened at his chest.

He was still breathing.

“What do we do?” Nicole was bawling openly. Julian shook his head. They turned to regard the professor. He was standing by the back door, beneath the light, holding up the twig. He had removed it from the confines of the plastic bag.

“At last…at last!” The professor drew his head back and laughed. And he laughed and he laughed, until Julian couldn’t tell anymore if the old man was laughing or crying or both. “Fifty years! Fifty, long, gruelling years. The pain, the bloodshed…oh, Anya…” Then the old man did begin to sob.

By Julian’s side, Nicole was softly weeping. She was shuddering with her tears.

“Oh, Brian…”

Julian blinked several times. His vision was far from clear without his glasses, but he could just make out what was going on. He squinted. Just a few feet into the distance, he could see the bag that had once contained the twig sitting on top of the newborn layer of snow, just by the side of the professor’s foot.

With black soot inside it.

Julian began crawling toward it.

The professor noticed and stopped crying. “Eh? What is it, boy?” He wiped away at his eyes and then glanced down. He turned his gaze back onto Julian.

He smiled. “Oh, so this is what you’re after?” He indicated the bag.

“Please…you have what you want…” Julian wiped at his face. His eyes were wet too. “…my friend…”

The professor stood tall. He planted his foot on the bag of soot. “And what if…”

He began to grind his heel into the bag with a twist. “…I…” Twist. “…just…”

Twist. “…don’t…” Twist. “…care?!” He stomped the thing into the ground. Just to be sure.

Nicole sprang up and dashed toward him. “No!”

The old man levelled his gun and shot her in the chest.

The impact caught and drove her back the other way. She sailed backward through the air. Crashing to the ground, she rolled twice and then banged up against the still body of Brian.

“No!” Julian flew to her side. He ripped open her jacket. A patch of red was spreading and advancing over her sweater and now covered her entire chest from neck to waist. He whipped his head around to glare at the professor. “You sick…bastard…”

The man tossed his head back. He cackled like a maniac. “That’s for making me chase after you in the snow!” He laughed some more. He eased over to the wall and leaned against it. His head was bent from breathing hard.

“You…” Julian trembled and his teeth chattered but not from the cold. Tears streaked down his face.

The professor glanced over at Julian. He smiled. “Ah, the pain. You are new to it?” He shook his head. “Let me tell you. When my Anya and I met, she was no older than your friend there. That’s what began my search, you know? When she died?”

Julian pressed down on Nicole’s wound. He checked her pulse. It was still there, but just barely.

“But now, all that has changed.” The professor’s eyes were dreamy. “The years change you. With the years, comes new pain. When you get old, and your body

betrays you. Weakness, pain, arthritis, cancer…chemotherapy…” He chuckled

but there was no sound. “I once thought as you did. Power was helping other

people. But it is not true. When the pain comes, there is only yourself. That is all

that matters.”

The old man drew himself tall. He straightened out his long coat. He placed his

cane down, leaning it against the wall. He held the twig high. “Now, the final moment is upon us. The end to all pain. The beginning to eternal life.” He

flipped his eyes onto Julian at the last. “And you know the funny thing, boy?

You’ve had it all this time…you see? I’ve watched you…” He laughed. “…and

you didn’t even know how to use it…” He laughed again.

He took a step toward Julian. “Now. Watch carefully.” He smiled.

The professor squared his stance.

He lifted up the twig.

He placed it into his mouth.

He bit off half.

Scrunching up his face, he began to chew. Chew and chew and chew. He ground his teeth on it and it stained his teeth black. It made his mouth water and spittle ran out from the side of it. He swallowed. And the sound of it was loud and so loud, Julian could hear it from where he was.

The old man turned to him and smiled. “You see? You must embrace it! It must become all of you.” He laughed. “Now, soon, I know…”

The man’s smile shot away. His eyes went wide. With his mouth open, he dropped to the ground and onto his knees. His hands flew to his throat like he

wanted to choke himself. He coughed. He gagged. He made throwing up noises, but nothing came up.

Throwing his head back, he widened his mouth even more and he faced the sky, as if in worship. And then it began.

Pain exploded in Julian’s chest and it threw him to the ground.

He was still conscious though and could see what was going on.

Light began to stream forth from Julian’s chest, like a channel was opened, a dam had burst, and now rivers of light and energy poured out from his chest and every pore in his body. It flowed toward the professor some ten feet away and entered into his chest and face and open mouth and eyes and ears and nose. Julian glanced at his friends and the same thing was happening to them too and though unconscious, they stirred a little. Energy burst forth from them and entered into the old man as well. The wind whipped up. The earth around them shook.

But to Julian there was only the pain and it was much and he screamed but in his ears, there was nothing but the roaring of the wind. He felt his body shrinking, shrivelling up like a raisin. He felt smaller. Perhaps it was in his mind, but it felt like his left leg was shrinking faster than his right.

Ten feet away, the professor was screaming too. His face began to change.

The wrinkles disappeared as the deep grooves flattened out. Hair sprang from his head and shoved the hat off his head. It was dark, the hair. It was black, like a shiny raven’s wing. Before, he had hardly any hair at all, but now it was full and black and thick and shiny and reached down past his shoulders. And then it was over.

As quickly as the process had begun, it was over. The wind eased back down to a gentle breeze and the earth was still. The pain in Julian’s chest stopped and he was certain that he had died, but he hadn’t. The rivers of light had winked

out like a switch had been thrown. It took a second for Julian’s eyes to adjust to the darkness now that the light had gone, but now he blinked through his tears and regarded the professor.

The old man, now no longer old, stood straight and tall by the light at the back door. His beard had fallen off his young chin and he was rubbing it. He was taller. By at least a foot. His trousers were now nearly up to his knees and his toes were extending past the tips of his ripped boots, like they had exploded through. His eyes were brighter. He blinked. Smiling, he nodded his head. He opened and closed his fists, testing out his strength.

He slipped off his overcoat. Beneath that, his shirt was too small and it was ripped in many places. He yanked it off, whipped it aside and stood half naked in the falling snow. He tossed his head back and laughed. He was covered in sweat. Even before the falling flakes of snow could touch him, they melted and turned to water. As he laughed, steam wafted away from his muscular, lean body, like a bodybuilder’s and it glowed in its health and vitality. He turned to

Julian. “You see, boy? Do you see?”

Julian blinked and it was about all he had the strength to do. He couldn’t feel the rest of his body. His hair was hanging over his left eye and covered it completely so he couldn’t see out of it, but his brain told him it didn’t matter.

Nothing mattered. His friends were likely dead, but that didn’t matter either. The old professor was saying something else now like he was preaching to a crowd but Julian couldn’t hear him and that also didn’t matter. Julian was sure he was going to die now, a wrinkled little prune, and it was a relief.

Please, he was saying to himself and anybody who would care to listen, I’ve had enough. This is enough. Whatever will happen next, whatever injustice in the world, whatever good, it will no longer be my business. It was clear now that

good had not triumphed after all. Evil did. The righteous will die and malevolence will win for another day and another turn and another battle. And so what if it did? I don’t care anymore. I am so tired. Please. Please, just let me go…

But the world is strange like that. It likes to do what it likes to do and sometimes it will do what it likes to do just to spite you. And so it is always when you are no longer interested, no longer wanting for something to happen, no longer caring that it will or will not happen, that it actually happens.

Like it was going to happen now.

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 13

Julian happened to notice, out of his right eye, that the twig, the half that hadn’tbeen bitten off, was sitting on the ground about four inches from his face. As he stared at it, it got picked up in the breeze and was rolled along the dirt until it settled into a nook some twenty feet away. But even at that distance, Julian could see that something strange was happening to it. He could see that from the end that had been bitten off, the broken end, a drop of liquid was just seeping out of the tip.

One drop. Just one drop. And then that drop, just that one drop—grew. It became bigger. And it started to glow. The breeze churned up and became a stronger wind. It began to turn in upon itself in a circle and became stronger and stronger still until it was a dust devil but centred on the glowing liquid. Whipping up the snow and the dirt in the area, the wind expanded even more so now it was a twister but the size of a phone booth.

The professor took notice and he stopped talking. He turned toward the mini whirlwind. “What is this?”

The size of the golden pool of sap at the bottom of the tornado continued to grow. Now it was a puddle and it began to bubble and it swallowed up the rest of the twig, melting it, absorbing its essence. As its edges crept outward, it swallowed up everything else it happened to touch as well.

The professor stepped in closer.

Light exploded.

The old man tumbled backward to the ground.

The pool’s initial glow had brightened a hundred fold and the light was now a golden spotlight, pointing a thousand miles straight up into the night sky. It was so thick and bright it looked solid and was a pillar of gold. At the source of that light, the bubbling puddle changed. It became more viscous, like a gel and then it rolled up and became round. It firmed up even more and as it did so, it took on a certain shape and now Julian could see that it was growing arms and legs and now it had a head too. It brightened even more and Julian scrunched his eyes tight.

A few seconds, and the light flicked off.

Julian opened his eyes. The tornado was gone. The night was quiet once more.

There in the distance, where the puddle and then the golden orb used to be, now standing in a bowl-like depression in the earth, was a child. A little boy.

From his size and features, he looked about three years old. Julian could tell he was a boy because he wore no clothes. He had curly blonde hair, now waving in a mild breeze, brazen and bright like the sun. The child glowed, but the light was like the golden sap at first and did not blind Julian. It was warm and soothing. The child’s skin sparkled with light. A Faerie. A cherub.

The professor had regained his feet. He approached the babe. “What the hell are you?”

The baby craned his neck back to look up at the professor. He began shaking his head. “You poor, silly child. That is not how it is used.”

The professor frowned. He shook his head and smiled.

“That is not how it is used, don’t you know?” The boy smiled. “Don’t you know this would not make you happy?” He planted his hands on his hips. “Come, let me show you.” The boy took a step toward the professor.

The professor backed away. “Now, wait just one…”

The boy pushed off from the ground with one toe and he was airborne. He flew toward the professor.

The old man spun around and with his newfound strength, took a run and then dove for a spot on the ground some twenty yards away. The boy floated along and followed.

As soon as he hit dirt, the professor whirled around and held his arm out in front

of him, pointing in the boy’s direction with a gun in his hand.

He fired off two rounds.

The boy was twelve feet away. There was never a chance.

The bullets hit the boy in the shoulder but they glanced off, like they had struck something hard, like steel or a stone or like a diamond.

The boy turned his head to regard his shoulder, as it was just phasing back from a bark-like colour to one of golden light again.

The professor’s eyes were like circles. He swallowed hard. He shook his head.

Another two rounds.

These two rounds did not bounce away. They hit the boy square in the chest and vanished inside. But there was no blood. No wound. Only two little red

spots on the surface of the skin.

Without looking, the boy lifted his hand to the spots, palm facing upward.

Slowly, like toothpaste being squeezed out of the tube, the two bullets eased out from the red spots on the boy’s chest and plopped into his open palm.

The professor’s jaw dropped. “You gotta be…”

The boy smiled. He bent his head to his hand. He puckered his lips and blew a breath onto the bullets.

They shot out from his hand. They hit and knocked the gun from the old man’s grasp.

“Now…” The boy nodded once. He clapped the dirt from his hands. “…I will show you.”

He zipped out to the professor who was still lying propped up on the ground with one arm and while hovering in the air, the boy reached out with his wee finger and touched the professor on the forehead.

Light burst forth.

This time, without screaming. This time, without pain.

A sudden gust whipped up and at the same time, torrents of light gushed out from the professor’s chest and into the chest of the three friends still lying on the ground. And it was warm and filling in Julian’s body. It satisfied. Like Christmas dinner. Like waiting for Santa but then falling asleep. Like the last school bell of the year in grade four and summer was outside in the yard, waiting. An assurance of goodness. A promise of abundance.

Julian drank it in and it filled and replenished him and it felt good and it felt like home, like belonging. Now he could feel the pain easing. He was no longer dried up. He was filling out again, even his left leg. And then he blinked and

found that he could see clearly, even though he wore no glasses. The energy, oh! The energy! He had to stand up…

He stood and scanned about him and saw that Brian and Nicole were standing too, smiling. Nicole was still covered in blood but it was only on her sweater.

Julian didn’t need to check her wound. Or Brian’s. He knew they were both all right. And they looked taller, at least another four inches, and older, more mature. Like they were nearing the end of their growing years instead of the beginning. Everything about them appeared stronger, brighter, more vital, more regal. And Julian knew he must appear the same way to the other two.

The light winked out. The wind died down.

The three regarded each other and smiled. Then together, they approached the little boy and the professor.

The old man, now an old man once again and shrivelled, was lying on the ground, with a rolled up shirt for a pillow that the little boy had tucked underneath his head. The man looked so small. And yet there was something in his face now, something that had not been there before, not even when the power of the Tree was upon him, but fully. There was this look, maybe something in his eyes, and you could tell that he was feeling less pain and not only physical. He was suffering less. From all the years of searching and longing and loss and now, here, finally, he had found true release. Freedom.

Julian knew that look. He knew it well. To a much higher degree, to be certain, but he knew it well.

As the three neared them, the boy was just covering up the old man with his overcoat and whispering something by his ear. “Now, do you see? Do you understand?”

The old man nodded. “Thank you,” he said, but there was no sound. He smiled.

The little boy reached out and closed the old man’s eyes. “Rest now, my son.”

The old man obeyed and was still. He could have been dead. Or asleep.

Turning around, the boy bounced up into the air to hover in front of Julian and his friends. He clapped his hands together. “Now, to business!” He turned and flew on ahead. The three followed.

“Where are we going?” The strength in Julian’s steps was amazing and caught him by surprise.

“Oh, I think you know.”

TREE OF LIFE BOOK I

CHAPTER 14

Tracing out a graceful arc in the air, the boy alighted on his tippy-toes on the landing of the back door of the group home. Where his small chubby feet touched the concrete slab, the cracks in it sprouted fresh grass and clovers. He reached up to the doorknob. When his fingers glanced up against the wooden panels, the paint chipped off and the wood beneath burst out flowers and they blossomed. He turned the knob and went inside. The three followed.

Upstairs, they passed by the nursing station. Men and women were there, including Joe, but whether standing or sitting, now they all had their eyes closed and were sleeping. Some were even bent over their desks and snoring. The three friends and their guide continued into the hall where the patient rooms were. Turning into one of them, they edged up to an older man, with salt and peppered grey hair, lying in his bed and even though asleep, had a deep furrow upon his brow. He was sweating and mumbling something incoherent.

Hovering in the air, the boy turned to Julian.

Julian stepped up. “Are you going to heal him now?” There were tears in his eyes.

The boy smiled. “No, my child.” He eased aside. And in easing aside, he left the way to the bed open for Julian to approach.

Julian frowned and shook his head. “I…I…”

“But this is for you!” The boy smiled. “Is this not what you have always wanted?”

Julian wiped away his tears. “I…” He bowed his head and stared into his empty hands. “…I…I don’t have the Tree anymore…” And the boy’s eyes widened for a moment. He tossed his head back and laughed. And he laughed and wind chimes sparkled in the breeze. He flew in closer and touched Julian on the ear. He smoothed back his hair. “Julian, my poor, silly boy. It was never the Tree alone…”

Julian frowned, tilting his head. He thought back to the time in the bathroom in his apartment. And then the time with Brian in the hall after practice. Then the time with Nicole and her skin, and then just now out in the alley. He thought he understood. And then maybe not. Or maybe he was somewhere in between.

The boy caressed Julian on the forehead, wiping away the frown. “Yes, there is the Tree. But more importantly, there is always a giving, a sacrifice, a price to be paid. It must come from you, from the very deepest part of you, and you must give willingly. If you will find it in you to give, then who is to say, that sometimes even when I am far away, perhaps even then others might be saved?” The boy took Julian by the shoulder. “Come. Try.”

Under the boy’s guidance, Julian placed his hands on the sides of his father’s head, right over his temples. His father did not wake.

“Try,” the boy said again.

Julian closed his eyes Images appeared in his mind but they were not good ones. He was in a cave, in complete blackness. There was no light, no warmth, no

escape. Voices shouted at him from out of the darkness, calling him names, telling him that it was hopeless and to kill himself. He tried to call forth light and it did come, but it was barely a candle flame. Yet in that flame, in the wan light of that fire, he could see them. Like banshees, like harpies flying all around him overhead, the shapes came at him, clawing at him, ripping him to shreds, making him bleed…

Julian opened his eyes. He found that he had fallen to the floor, covered in sweat and breathing hard. Brian and Nicole were by his sides, helping him up.

Julian stumbled over to the boy with his friends supporting him. “You must help him. Please. I cannot do it alone…”

The boy shook his head. “He is your father.”

Brian looked at the boy. Then at Julian. Brian stepped up. “I will help.”

Nicole smiled. “Me too.”

The boy regarded the three. He lifted one brow. “Then you understand the giving? The price?”

Julian’s friends nodded.

“And what if the price is too great? What if all that you have gained this night is lost again? What if even with the three of you together, it is still not enough?”

Nicole bit her lip. She turned to Julian. “We can do this.”

He shook his head. “I…I don’t know…”

Brian clasped him by the shoulder. “Julian! We can do this. We will be enough.”

Nicole nodded. “Yes, we will be enough. You. Me.” She glanced at Brian. “Jerk for brains.” Julian looked deep into her eyes. Those eyes. And her hair. Though only strands of moonlight broke through the window on the far side of the room, it seemed

to rush over to her hair and it glowed. Julian turned to Brian. Brian, whom he had known since they were in diapers together and yes, it was true, he has seen Julian naked. More than once.

“Well, then?” The boy crossed his arms.

Julian regarded his friends and he smiled. Turning as one, they looked up at the boy in the air. They nodded. They approached the bed together.

Julian placed his hands on his father, as before. Brian planted his hands on

Julian’s shoulder on one side, Nicole on the other. They closed their eyes and concentrated.

In the cave, the shapes rushed at him again. But this time, Julian summoned the light and it was brighter. Julian looked down and there was golden armour upon his body and the claws of the monsters bounced off. He lifted his arm. There was a sword in Julian’s hand, a sword that sang out a battle cry as he swung it and it was bathed in flame. He held it high, against the monsters in the darkness and found that in an instant they were retreating, slipping out of the cave by way of a hollow in the wall in the distance, an exit against the far wall that he had not appreciated before.

As the swarm oozed out, he stepped up to a stone table in the centre of the room, up upon a dais, to retrieve his long awaited prize. Lying upon the table was his father, a babe, no more than a year old, an infant, now curled up against the cold and shivering, whimpering. Julian lifted him and cuddled him against his chest. With his sword held high to light the way, together, Julian and the baby left that cave and the monsters and the voices behind.

Julian opened his eyes. He breathed out. Glancing to either side of him, he smiled at his friends and nodded, thanking them. They were drenched in sweat and so was he. Nicole reached up to clear her brow. In the bed, Julian’s father remained asleep, though no longer mumbling or jerking in his slumber, just

breathing in long, easy breaths—in, out, in, out. They stepped away from the bed.

Brian’s eyes widened. “Hey!” He clenched his fists. “We haven’t changed!

We’re still like before…your leg!”

Julian lifted his left leg. It was true. All the gifts that the healing had left from before were still there. They smiled. They looked up to the boy, hovering by them and saw that his right hand was glowing a little more than the rest of him.

The boy followed their gaze and glanced at his right hand. “Oops.” He tucked it behind his back. “Well…I helped.” He shrugged. “A little.”

Julian approached him and bowed his head. “Thank you.”

The boy nodded. He clapped his hands together. “Now, I must go. My time with you has come to an end.”

Julian gasped. “But I still have so many questions!”

“Indeed, Julian, your questions will never end. Don’t you know that by now?” He floated over to him, indicated for him to reach out his hand, and then placed something into it. “We will have need of this before the end.”

Julian inspected his hand.

A seed.

Julian looked up at the boy. “What is this?”

“That…” The boy nodded. “…is a tremendous responsibility. I have chosen to trust you, like no other I have ever trusted before. Do not disappoint me.”

Julian bit his lip as he stared into his hand. He turned his gaze back up at the boy and shook his head. “I…I don’t think you should give it to me.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know how to use it…”

“But…”

“No, I mean…how will I know who to help? Who not to help? I…”

The boy smiled. He came close and touched him on the cheek. “That you are able to ask such things, proves that I have chosen wisely.”

“But…”

“Do not worry, little one. You will make a fine vessel of power. I can see it.” He planted his hand on Julian’s chest. “Within this breast, beats the heart of a great physician.”

Julian sighed. “That’s what my mom keeps saying.”

“As for that…” The boy indicated the seed. “…keep it well, but keep it a secret, for now. One day, when the time comes, you will know. And now I must go.”

He flitted over to Nicole and kissed her on the cheek. He patted Brian on the head. Then it was down the hall and then the stairs and he was gone.

As soon as the little boy had flown away, Julian’s father began to stir in the bed.

Julian’s eyes widened. “Oh no!” He led the way out of the room and motioned for the other two to follow. They rushed out of the building.

By the time they got outside, the little boy had already disappeared. They checked the area and found that the professor had gone too, overcoat and all.

The sun was just coming up over the lip of the lower apartments, on the far side of the street. Under the scrutiny of the early morning light, the only evidence that anything had happened at all the previous night were the flowers from the wood in the door panel, and the clovers and the blades of grass on the cement porch.

Brian planted his hands on his hips. He squinted in the sunlight. “Is anybody else hungry?”

~~~

EPILOGUE

Brian and Julian waited in the alley behind Julian’s apartment building. This was the beginning of May, a few months after everything had happened. The snow was all gone, but the air remained chilly this early in the morning.

“Where is she?” Brian stomped his foot on the ground. “We’re going to be late.” Julian checked the laneway. “Here she comes.”

Nicole pulled up. “Hey.”

“What took you?”

“I was…”

Brian rolled his eyes. “Oh, no…”

Nicole crossed her arms. “…oh what do you know? You’re just a boy!”

The two began to exchange words.

Julian smiled and ignored them. He glanced up and noticed that his parents were hanging out on the balcony of their apartment, which happened to open out onto where they were standing. His dad had a coffee cup in his hand. His mom had one arm looped around her husband’s waist. His father peered down at Julian on the ground below him. He smiled and waved. Julian waved back.

Julian began marching off for school. “Come on,” he said over the words of the other two.

Brian fell in step beside him. “Hey man, are you crying?”

“No. Shut up.” Julian wiped away at his face.

Brian smiled. “Hey, why are you crying, man?”

“Are you deaf? Shut up.”

Nicole rolled her eyes. “Boys.” Tucking her hairbrush deeper into her bag, she followed.

THE END