Taralynn’s Desk

Robynne sighed and tapped her pencil on the desk. She flipped the pages of her book looking for the details she needed to answer her biology problem. Pushing her red hair back the redhead sighed, hating the pointless regurgitation of what the book said. She much preferred the problem solving and use of equations in her geometry class; those actually challenged her to solve something. She didn’t like homework or anything, but if she was going to do it she at least wanted to feel like she was getting smarter.

She glanced upwards at her lava lamp and watched a few seconds as it bubbled and oozed. Robynne had forced to move her alarm clock next to the hypnotic decoration so she wouldn’t lose track of time as she gazed into it. After about a minute she watched the numbers on her clock change, which reminded her to get back to the task at hand. Only three more problems to do, then she’d be done with all the homework that she should have done yesterday instead of playing Settlers of Catan.

More worrisome was the fact that Kara would be home with her Tuesday homework in less than an hour. Still if she had to do it all over, she would play Settlers of Catan again. It was a fun change of pace from her boring day, allowed her to enjoy a more social setting than she normally went for, and gave her some possible insight to Tremolo Bass’s identity. Uncle Taylor had always told Rob to make your decision and not look back. She smiled and recited his often quoted advice, “You can’t change the past and you don’t know the future. Just do what you can here and now.”

She picked up her cell phone looked at her recent text messages. With a few exceptions from some of the cheerleaders, they were almost all from Uncle Taylor. She clicked on her most recent one. “Sorry that you feel sick. Make sure to drink lots of water and get some rest. Remember that you CAN call me and talk to me if you need anything. I’d love to hear from you. -Taylor.”

Robynne rested her head on her book. “I wish I could, Uncle. I really do.”

Kara leaned in and examined the printed off photo. “Hmm, of the ones you showed me this one would be the most easily doable. I would just need to buy more fabric.”

Robynne pulled out her wallet. “I’d hate for you to spend the money yourself, since you’re going to be helping me with this costume. How much do you think it would cost?”

Kara shrugged. “I’ll need to do some measurements on you first to figure out how much fabric I need. I think I’m going to simplify the belt some. Still not quite sure how to do your boots either. I’ve actually never made shoes for an outfit before. This should be a fun challenge.”

Robynne blushed a little. “I uh, don’t want this to take up too much of your time, Kara. If it’s going to be too difficult…”

Kara looked up at the ceiling, as if trying to piece together the outfit in her mind. “I haven’t had a challenge lately. Costumes are a great way for me to branch out. Besides, it’s not like I’m working on this alone.”

“You’re not?”

“No, you’re going to be helping me.”

Robynne took a step back. “Helping you? Me?”

“Of course.”

“But Kara I don’t know the first thing about sewing.”

Kara beamed. “That’s why I’m going to teach you.”

Robynne scratched the back of her neck. “I don’t know. I don’t really want to…”

Kara rolled her eyes. “Robynne, I’m not trying to turn you into a housewife. If I’m going to make your costume, I’m going to want you to assist me. It’s only fair. If you’re going to assist me you’re going to have to learn a few basics. Besides, it’s useful to know the basics of sewing; if a shirt or pair of pants you like rips or something you could repair it instead of throwing it away.”

“I guess you’re right.”

“Of course I’m right.” Kara smiled and put a reassuring hand on the taller Robynne’s shoulder. “Would I ever lie to you?”

The redhead smirked. “Kara, I’m fairly certain that you don’t even know how to lie.”

She giggled, “I’m aware of the theory behind it.”

“You miss your uncle then. Is that it?”

Robynne nodded. “Well, I mean, I haven’t gotten to speak to him ever since the mall fight and that was over a month ago.”

Noriko cocked her head to the side. “And this is difficult for you?”

Robynne leaned back in her chair. “Well yeah. He’s basically my dad. He’s taught me everything I know. Don’t you talk to your family often?”

Noriko looked down at her sword, a quizzical look overcoming her face. “I do not. I correspond through handwritten letters to my father, who is the leader of my clan. It takes slightly over a week to send letters to him as the letters are hand delivered by messengers who travel by boat, then go through a series of protocols to make sure correspondence is not intercepted.”

“What? By boat? Why do that when you could just text him or email stuff.”

“My father says the new ways are too easily traced. ‘Shinobi should trust in the old ways to slip past watchful eyes. The more and more the world moves towards the new, the harder it will be for them to track the old.’ It makes good logical sense.”

“Well yeah, but he’s family. Don’t you want to talk to your parents and your siblings?”

“I suppose my familial relationships would seem strange to those outside of the Yukimura clan. We are taught loyalty to the clan first, then to our individual families. We are trained from a very young age to go long periods of time without human contact.”

Robynne raised an eyebrow. “Trained how?”

A flash of pain crossed Noriko’s eyes. It was the briefest instant but Robynne knew what she saw. She wasn’t sure if Noriko knew she saw it, but regardless her eyes steeled themselves from betraying any emotions or thoughts in an instant. “When I was five my father placed me inside a room a little over the size of our bathroom. I was given candles for light, manuals to study, and enough food so that I could live on two small meals a day. The training is designed to achieve two things. The first is to teach you patience, for shinobi must sometimes wait weeks hiding in the shadows waiting for the target to present an opportunity to strike. The second goal of the training is to teach us early on to disassociate ourselves from our need for contact with others. Sentimentality can lead to sloppiness in battle.”

Robynne gaped in amazement. “Wow. You were five years old when this happened.”

Noriko ran the sharpening stone across the length of her blade. “Correct.”

Robynne snorted skeptically. “And you successfully have ‘disassociated yourself from the need to be without human contact?’”

Noriko stopped sharpening the sword. “I have… need for improvement in this area.”

“I don’t really think you need improvement in this, Noriko. I don’t care if you’re a ninja or not, people need to interact with each other.”

“’A shinobi is a tool,’ my father always said.”

“Yeah, well, your father is wrong. You want to see a tool you just come to cheerleading practice with me. More than enough tools there.”

Noriko actually smiled. Robynne nearly fell over in her chair at the sight. “A humorous play on words. But not as humorous as being instructed to spend more time with other humans by the girl who seeks more enjoyment behind a computer screen than any other I have observed.”

Robynne scratched her head. Was Noriko actually trying to… tease her? “Yeah, well, I too need improvement in this area.” She sighed and turned back to her computer screen. “I guess that’s why Mary made sure neither one of us could back out of her little Friday night slumber party.”

Noriko held her sword up to the light, twisting it back and forth observing how the light glinted off of the edge. “Indeed. I am uneasy about this… slumber party. If Mary is organizing it then I expect to be unprepared for what will happen.”

“You? Unprepared? I mean, I can understand how I could be unprepared, but how could Mary make you feel unprepared?”

Noriko plucked one of her long, ebony strands from her hair. She carefully grabbed the end of the hair and pressed it to the edge of sword, and watched the hair part into two halves. “Mary is in many ways the exact opposite of a shinobi, with her explosions of emotion and random bursts of energy. But at the same time, she possesses one trait that is completely in line with the way of shinobi.”

Robynne gulped. It caused her a great deal of concern to know that her roommate could quite literally split hairs. “That being?”

“Mary’s motivations are completely inscrutable. Whereas a shinobi achieves this through complete isolation of their emotions, Mary achieves this by displaying such a cacophony of emotion that one cannot truly guess what is happening within her mind.”

Robynne laughed. “Makes you wonder if she plans it all out ahead of time or makes it up on the fly.”

“Her ability to improvise is quite admirable.”

“Admirable? I’d say scary. I hate having no idea what a person I live with is going to do.”

“The two are not mutually exclusive, Robynne.”

Robynne yawned as she walked into her webmaking class. Mary giggled. “You’ve been out of class for two days. How on earth could you be tired?”

“How could I be tired? I had to stay up late to finish my homework then had to wake up at six fruitcake in the morning to get ready for the day. Why did I have to be given such long hair?”

“Uh, because it looks great on you! Duh!” Mary knocked on Robynne’s head like it was a door. “Fate works on the principles that if you’re going to be the center of fighting evil you need to look great doing it! You know that.”

Robynne swatted at Mary’s hand like a fly. “Knock that off.”

Mary jumped backwards. “Ooo! Robynne doesn’t like people touching her! Poke-a-Robynne! Poke-a-Robynne!” Mary proceeded to jab her fingers into Robynne’s side, trying to tickle her friend.

“Hey! Ahaha! Cut it out, you little pest! That hurts! The stitches!” She tried to swipe Mary’s “attacks” to the side but the small girl was proving too quick.

“Robynne, there you are. I’m so glad to see you’re okay.” Mary’s shenanigans ceased as Mr. Terry walked towards the two girls.

Robynne straighten her uniform’s vest which Mary had ruffled with her incessant poking. “Thanks Mr. Terry. It’s nice to be back.”

“How do you feel? I heard you got stabbed in the side.”

Robynne nodded. “Yeah, I did. It hurt.”

Mr. Terry smiled. “I’ll bet it did. What did you do to make the monster mad enough to stab you. It didn’t seem to get all hostile with anyone but you and that other cheerleader. What was her name again?”

“Jody.”

“Yes, Jody. She wasn’t stabbed was she?”

“No, she just… I don’t know, was knocked out or something. Felt really weak.” Not wanting to give that she too much she just shrugged. “I’m not really sure what happened to her. When the monster appeared we all ran away and I got stabbed in the confusion.”

Mr. Terry nodded his head and stared down at his shoes. He scratched his gray beard, as if digging for an answer. Robynne quirked her head to the side as she stared into his face. She had never really noticed before but Mr. Terry’s face was younger than most men who had gone completely grey; she tried to imagine him without the beard and could see he looked closer to Ms. Kuna’s age… well, when she wasn’t a wallaby. “It just makes no sense. I’ve tried to piece it together, all the monster attacks, I mean.”

Mary quirked her head to the side. “Well, the concept of monsters in general makes no sense, sir.”

“It’s not that, Mary. Just look at where all the attacks have happened: amusement parks, shopping malls, arcades, ice cream parlors, toy stores. They are all things that younger individuals, typically teenagers go to. Who would want to attack teenagers? Why?”

Robynne and Mary glanced at one another and just shrugged.

Mr. Terry chuckled to himself. “Of course you wouldn’t know. Nobody really knows.” He paused and scratched his ears. “Nobody here seems to anyway. Just be mindful of your surroundings, girls. There is something going on here and it seems to be aimed squarely at people your age. And if I’m right that means you two and everyone else in this school needs to be on their guard.”

Robynne and Mary exchanged more awkward and confused looks with one another. “We’ll be careful, Mr. Terry.”

“Yeah! You can count on us, sir!”

He smiled and patted the girls on their shoulders. “That’s good. Sorry for rambling. Class is about to start so get seated girls.”

The pair sat down next too each other and logged into their computers. Mary muttered under her breath just loud enough for Robynne to hear. “Awkwaaaaard.”

Robynne nodded her head. “Uh, yeah. Just a little.”

Cory and Eli milled about the grocery store. Cory took a look at the prices of potato chips and frowned. “Why didn’t we call your sister to give us a ride to All-Mart again? Everything is cheaper there.”

Eli sighed. “I did call. She didn’t answer. She was probably at volleyball practice. Besides, we’re doing Robynne a favor.”

Cory scoffed. “Doing her a favor! She’s milking her injury for all she can.”

“Dude, she was stabbed in the side by a teddy bear monster. I’m not sure carrying groceries around is what the doctor had in mind when he told her to take it easy for a week or two.”

“I know that. But you DO know she’s taking advantage of the fact that she knows we shop for groceries on Thursday night.”

Eli shook his head. “Curse our former roommate for knowing our schedules.”

“Indeed, we should change it up just to show her!”

“There is something majorly wrong with you.”

“That’s nothing new. You’ve been telling me that since kindergarten.”

“And it’s been true every time.” Eli glanced back down at the list Robynne gave him. “Okay, she also needs chocolate ice cream and has even appended a note to this item.”

Cory pushed the cart forward than jumped on the back of it, riding down the cereal isle like a small child. The cart started tipping over and he bailed. “Guess we don’t have enough weight on this thing yet. What does the note say?”

“It says, ‘Mary assigned me to buy the ice cream for her sleepover tomorrow. Don’t buy the cheap brand as Mary has threatened to make me regret it if I skimp on quality ice cream for her party.’ Yeah, that sounds like your girlfriend, all right.”

Cory turned into the ice cream isle. “She’s not my girlfriend.”

“Please, Fate made you two with each other in mind… or out of mind depending how you look at it. What do you think, Dreyer’s or Breyer’s?”

“Soulmate accusations aside, it doesn’t make a difference to me. Frankly, when we were kids I thought they were the same ice cream with a typo on it. Do you think the chocolate flavor was ordered by Mary or is our little Robynne blossoming into the stereotypical girl she really is at heart?”
Eli chuckled. “I’m willing to bet Mary ordered it. Robynne strikes me as someone who would fight against the girly stereotypes at all costs.”

“Even if she actually does like chocolate more than other flavors?”

“For the sake of avoiding the stereotype, I think she would pick another flavor. So what is the deal with this party? I mean, I don’t ever remember us arranging who brings what snacks and what games we’d be playing back when we had our get-togethers in middle school. We’d just eat whatever was in the fridge and play whatever video game that we decided on… or Risk.”

“Ah, Risk. Good times. Good times.”

“We also definitely wouldn’t play a boring game like Apples to Apples.”

Cory paused at that mention, remembering his experience being sucked into another one of Robynne’s dreams. “Eli, you been sucked into anymore dreams?”

Eli shook his head and plopped the Dreyer’s ice cream into their cart. “Not since that last one where we ended up cheering. That was disconcerting. Why do you ask?”

“I uh, kinda got sucked into one a few days ago.”

“What? Well, what happened?”

“Well, I was taking a nap in the middle of the day when it happened so I think it was while she was unconscious after her fight with the teddy bear.”

“Uh huh?”

“And in it, well, I was a knight hunting in the forest for some monster before walking through a door…”

“A door in the forest?”

“It’s a dream, okay? So I walk through the door and find all the girls dressed in togas or something…”

“This isn’t going to get all Freudian is it?”

“No! Thank goodness, no! Anyway as I walked in I… uh…” Remembering Eli’s comments about Mary and himself being made for each other, he decided not tell him he actually turned into Mary in the dream. “… saw the girls holding a lot of apples and seemed to be playing some kind of game with them. If I’m correct with how Apples to Apples is played, I think that was the game they were playing.”

Eli paused as he picked up a bag of frozen chicken. “Wait, Robynne had this dream right after the fight with the teddy bear. Mary didn’t start planning this party until later I thought.”

“Yeah. I noticed that as well.”

“So… well then did anything else happen?”

“Yeah,” Cory explained while grabbing a gallon of milk, “soon Robynne’s phone rang and the voice of some guy said, ‘I’m here, Robert.’ After that, the color left her face and I woke up.”

Eli leaned on the cart thinking. “So… what does that mean? Her last dream predicted what would happen in the football game, but that’s not that crazy. That could happen.”

Cory shrugged and scratched his head. “I—I don’t know. What I do know is we should maybe be on our toes tomorrow.”

Noriko examined the cards very carefully and closed her eyes. Robynne could tell Noriko was taking this game a lot more seriously than she would have. Mary wolfed down a bowl of ice cream while Mallory yawned. “C’mon, Noriko! Christmas is coming.”

Noriko shifted the cards in her hand, showing no signs of being moved my Mallory’s complaints. “Regardless of how slow or quickly one decides, Christmas is always in a state of ‘coming.’ Your complaint has little weight.” She put the cards down and handed them over to Robynne. “And you win.”

Angela raised an eyebrow. “And how do you know she won that hand? You didn’t even say what card won.”

Noriko blinked then looked at Robynne. “Were you not the owner of ‘The Government’ card, Robynne.”

Robynne raised an impressed eyebrow. “I was.”

“Well, the subject was ‘powerful’ and I decided the card that most fit powerful was ‘the government’ so Robynne did win that hand.”

Mallory laughed and dipped a chip into the salsa. “You and your ninja powers…”

“Powers would not be an accurate…”

“Abilities! Fine. No need to split hairs.”

Robynne scoffed. “Not that she couldn’t.” She had a hard time believing what she was seeing. The sun was setting outside the window but, as Mary had demanded was sleepover policy, the girls had already dressed in their pajamas. None of the girls were indecent by any stretch of the imagination, but all were dressed in tight fitting tanks, camisoles, shorts, loose pajama bottoms, and slippers. Even Mary had bought Robynne a sky blue top for the occasion. She would have wished the word “cozy” hadn’t been stitched into the fabric but she saw no harm in wearing it amongst the other girls.

Kara shrugged. “Well how many is that for you Robynne?”

Robynne counted up the number of green cards she had. Though she was loathe to admit it out loud. She was having fun. She figured she’d retract that statement when they started watching whatever teen girl drama Mary had picked out for the movie, but so far being in a sleepover party wasn’t the torturous experience she had predicted. As long as they avoided braiding each others’ hair and painting their toenails this night would shape up just fine. “So far, I have four.”

Mary smirked. “Still two behind me.”

Mallory sighed. “I only have one.”

Angela’s shoulder’s lowered. “I still haven’t won one.”

Robynne felt bad for Angela and tried to change the subject. “So, my turn now.” She reached onto the table and grabbed a green card. “All right, the word is… scary.” Robynne blinked for a second, feeling something familiar about this card.

Mallory grinned and slammed one of her red cards on the table. “I got a good one for this, I think. Maybe not scary like a ghost, but real life scary.” Robynne instinctually looked behind Mallory, as if expecting something to pop up behind her.

Angela put her red card on the table. “I don’t know, Mal. If it’s real life scary we’re talking about, then I think my card will win.” Robynne looked at the window, not knowing why but feeling very nervous all of the sudden.

Without a word, the ninja-girl placed her card on the table. Robynne expected to hear music start blaring for some reason. What was going on? Why did it feel like she had been here before? Then it hit her—she had dreamed this before.

Kara smiled and placed her card with the others. “Robynne, I think considering what’s happened to you recently, that you’ll agree that this can be rather scary.”

Almost like she was a passenger to the scene before her, Robynne quietly muttered, “I’ll be the judge of that.”

All the girls eyes were on Mary now. With a soft giggle she placed her card on the table. “Horror movies. That’s all I have to say about mine.”

Robynne winced and shook her head, trying to remember what came next in the dream. “All right, let’s see what we got.” She shuffled the cards up a bit and then turned them over. The Woods. Parties. Blood. Riots. Science Fair Projects.

Robynne sighed. The memory of the dream was becoming more clear. She remembered what had happened as each girl had placed their cards. “Mallory was Science Fair Projects. Angela was Riots. Noriko was Parties. Kara was Blood. Mary was The Woods.”

All the girls paused and looked at each other. Even Noriko looked a bit concerned that someone saw through her. It was finally Angela who broke the silence, “Robynne how did you know that? Do you know us all that well?”

Robynne shook her head as the color left her face. Something was about to happen. But what had happened next in the dream? “No… I dreamed this. This exact scene. This exact order.”

Mallory stopped leaning on the couch and sat up. “Another vision. So,” Mallory pushed a hair out of her face, “what happened next.”

Robynne picked her cell phone off the ground, finally remembering how her dream ended. “My phone rang.” As if Fate had dialed the number herself, the cell phone sprung to life. All six girls held their breath as Robynne answered it. “H-h-hello?”

“Robynne, this is Eli.” Eli’s voice carried a tone of panic.

“Eli, what is it? Are you guys getting attacked by a monster or something?”

“No, uh, I’d say it’s worse.”

Robynne squinted. “Worse? What could be worse than a monster attacking you guys?”

Silence hung over the line for a moment. Eli cleared his throat. “Robynne. It’s your uncle.”

“My uncle?”

“Yeah. He’s here Robynne. He’s here in our apartment. And he’s asking for Robert.”

Bun-nu-NAAAAAAA! I wish I could make sound effects as you read. That would be fun. Maybe I can do that for a one shot story in the future.

And that’s right, I just went there! Guess what, the drama of Robert Dirken’s old life has finally come home to roost. Get ready for fun and frivolity as Robynne explains that she’s a full fledged girl to her uncle, and shows him Dale, her new boyfriend… okay some of that might not happen.

Anyway, this chapter was very disjointed but I loved doing every little segment. The more I write the more I want to use Noriko. I love her so much. She’s my little ninja and I never want to let her go. Oh that I could have a Noriko plushie on my desk to inspire me to greatness! I also loved involving Mr. Terry some. Did you ever have a teacher like him? Where he thinks out loud? I liked those teachers as sometimes they would say the darndest things!

So… what is Robynne wearing for Halloween? I would LOVE to hear your guesses!

Holy cow… FORTY EPISODES! I can’t believe I’ve gotten this far! Amazing! Thanks for all the support you have given me!

Later,
Taralynn