Alternate First Chapter

Below is an alternate version of the first chapter of Guardians and Dreamers. As I've been working on revisions, I've come to realize that the early chapters don't have the same tone as the later chapters. In addition, I'm hoping this alternate version--plus the changes I'm planning on for the first five chapters to start--improves the narrative flow of the whole book. 

And then there's also this: I've been thinking about making these changes to appeal to an older audience. Well, that's the idea anyway.

Hope you enjoy. Let me know what you all think.

Chapter 1
Disconnect

The bus rattled on, bouncing and bounding down the street. It housed, even this late in its trip from the high school to its scheduled drop offs. Students varied in age, but most were paired off, seating two to a seat. Most pairs were friends, laughing at some joke or conspiring in quiet voices. Some were romantic couples, stealing silent moments before the inevitable split as one of the pair had to depart the bus and head home. However, there were three teenagers, sitting near the back of the bus, who were sitting by themselves, one ugly green bench each. One of these teenagers was tall, thin, and had light brown hair and hazel eyes. He paid no attention to the others on the bus, and he generally preferred it this way. Instead, he looked out the window and watched the houses, fast food restaurants, and a variety of other buildings pass on by. To him, the entire city looked as though it were painted in a tan color. Everything, including the people, was covered in a thin layer of dust it seemed. This, among other things in his life, greatly depressed Jason.

During these monotonous trips from school to his drop off point, Jason tried his hardest to avoid the other students, and generally speaking followed his lead. However, this didn’t stop a couple of the more aggressive types from speaking up every once in a while. Indeed, at the very moment we join Jason’s story, a couple of rather large, muscular guys just a couple of rows ahead of Jason’s seat were glancing back at Jason. One was dark haired and the other a light brown, but other than that could have passed for brothers. Again and again, they would glance back then abruptly turn away laughing. There was something at the back of the bus they found hilarious, and Jason had the distinct impression their humor was directed toward his area of the bus. Under normal circumstances, such an occurrence would have gone unnoticed, but a few minutes after the hilarity started the dark-haired one spoke loud enough to draw Jason’s attention.

“Hey… You.” Each word punched through the loud rumble and rattle of the bus’ journey, loud enough that everyone on the bus turned to look. Everyone, that is, except another boy sitting along on the bus. The moment the obnoxious greeting boomed throughout the bus, a boy Jason only recognized in passing sunk low in his seat, probably hoping that if he made himself small enough, the other guy would go away and leave him alone. However, unlike with other wild animals. teenage boys are much harder to distract with absence. Indeed, it seemed as though the very act of growing smaller had the exact opposite effect the boy had intended.

Jason only recognized the boy because of the vague familiarity one gets by spending eight hours of more a day in a high school. Even if the population of the school exceeded a thousand, there are just some faces that become recognizable. Jason knew the boy to have thick black hair, usually in a state of distress no matter what time of day it was, and the boy also had a pair of dark eyes; Jason assumed they were a dark brown because he'd never known anyone to have black eyes before. And, like Jason, the boy's body had the thin, almost unhealthy quality, the kind of look familiar with the high metabolism of adolescent males. In Jason's eyes, the boy's most distinguishable feature was that Jason had never heard the boy utter a sound of any kind.

The larger, stockier boys ducked low and changed seats. Of course, this was against the rules, but such distinctions didn't bother them, and the bus driver was paying closer attention to driving than to what was happening in the back of the bus. One moved into the seat of the boy trying to make himself invisible. The other moved into the empty seat just in front. Whatever was going to happen, Jason knew there wasn't much the quiet boy could do. He was trapped, and Jason looked away.
Jason’s heart beat faster; his stomach tightened. A low mumbling reached his ears; it crawled beneath his skin in a surprising way. Something menacing was going on in the seat behind him. Jason could glean at least that much from the whispers. A quick glance toward to the back of the bus and Jason saw the larger boy’s arm draped around the quiet one’s shoulder. It looked like he was explaining
something to the smaller boy, affecting a friendly air, but his eyes were anything but.

The watery black eyes of the quiet boy glanced up and saw Jason looking at them. And for the briefest moment, they called, pleaded, begged for help, some way out. The tightening in Jason’s stomach grew worse, and Jason’s head started throbbing in pain. He wanted to help, wanted to find someway of stopping the torture. But he couldn’t. Almost as if he were changing the channel of his life, Jason turned away. There was nothing he could do anyway. At least that’s what he told himself to feel better.

The problem? It didn’t make him feel better. Not at all. In fact, with his eyes focused on the dusty vision outside his window, Jason’s ears focused in on the conversation just a bench away. The voices coming from that bench didn’t get louder. No, they just became clearer, and although he tried as hard as he could Jason just couldn’t shut them out.

“You know, Ted and I were wondering something. Hopefully you can help us out a little. You want to help us out, right? Right?”

The quiet boy must have nodded or given some other sign for the one-not-named-Ted continued. “Good. I thought you might.” He paused. Jason could almost see the smile spread across the larger boy’s face. “See, there’s something I’ve been trying to understand. Trying to wrap my head around something. I saw you sitting here in this seat, and I just have to ask.” He paused again, really putting on a show now. “What is it like being a fag?”

Jason held his breath and closed his eyes. The blood in his veins warmed, burning his skin.
The larger boy continued, “I mean, if you want to act like a girl, then why not dress the part? Why not wear a dress and carry a purse? Oh wait,” Jason imagined the larger boy picking up something and remembered the smaller boy carrying a shoulder bag, “you do have a purse. You are a girl.” Both the larger boy and his friend, Ted, laughed. Jason found nothing funny about this, and even their hollow laughter lacked humor. The interview went on. But they didn’t stop there. Despite Jason wishing for this all to end, despite wishing his stop would just appear, despite wishing someone—anyone—would act, nothing happened. The bus rattled on, rolling over potholes and stopping at traffic lights, slowly making its way to the next stop, but no big hurry. Never that.

“Your stop is coming up next, right?” The quiet boy must have nodded. “No it’s not. Not today, anyway. You’re going to get off with your new friends and tell us all about being a fag. We want to give you a chance to explain it to us. Right, Ted?”

Jason knew no such explanation was going to occur. He imagined something more violent.
The bus slowed. Jason opened his eyes and saw the elementary school that served as his bus stop every school day. Taking a bit of a chance, Jason twisted in his seat, careful not to be too noticeable, and saw the larger boy whispering something to the quiet boy. The larger boy’s hand gripped his victim’s shoulder, holding the boy fast to his seat.

Before the bus came to a complete stop, Jason stood, and for a moment locked eyes with the smaller boy. He tried, with his eyes, to say, “I’m sorry,” but his own fear held him back from doing more. Jason turned and walked off the bus, guilt filling his gut with every step.

* * *

The house was silent when he walked through the front door. It always was.

Jason shut the door behind him, careful not to disturb the quiet. The walk home had left him winded, but he nevertheless took short silent breaths, again careful. For a couple of years now, Jason and his younger brother, Aaron, and their mother had silently agreed to maintain the silence that had descended upon the house. Speak only when necessary. Even the television, when it was on, was kept at a respectable level. Silence blanketed them all, shutting everything and everyone out.

Leaning against the door to catch his breath, Jason closed his eyes and tried to forget what he had witnessed on the bus, what he had failed to do.

When he did open his eyes, he saw the entryway that lead from the front door and opened up into the living room. To the left, a hallway led to the three bedrooms. But none of that drew his eyes. A full-length, thick-framed mirror leaned against the wall to his right. Like the blanket of silence, the mirror had been there, leaning against that wall, for a couple of years. None of the family had the heart to move it somewhere more fitting.

“Jason? Is that you?” His mother’s soft voice floated from the kitchen.

“Yes, mom.” Jason said, eyeing the mirror, guilt filling his stomach once again. He didn’t want to walk in front of it. He wanted to go right to his room and shut the door. But his mother had other ideas.

“Can you come here, please?”

“I’ll be right there.” Jason took a deep breath and rushed passed the mirror, avoiding his own reflection. He dropped his backpack on the floor just before he entered the kitchen. Its usual spot. His mother never seemed to mind where he put his backpack.

His mother sat at the kitchen table, staring out of a large window just behind the table. Her hand was placed on her chin as if her head needed the extra support. Her eyes looked beyond the backyard at something else, something vague and distant. Like usual, she was not here.

Jason stood on the opposite side of the table and waited a moment for his mother to recognize his presence. Moments passed.

Jason spoke first. “Mom?”

His mother turned her head to face her son; her eyes still unfocused. “Oh, I’m sorry, Jason… Lost in thought I guess.” She paused, still not really seeing Jason. “A friend of mine went into labor about an hour ago, and I need to go to the hospital to be there for her.”

“Is it Aunt Christi?”

“Yes.” Her voice strengthened a bit, slight rise in excitement. “I need you to stay here with your brother.”

Jason could think of other, better things to with his time. But mostly, he wanted to be alone. “Why can’t he go with you?”

His mother’s eyes finally seemed to see Jason, and for a moment or two they lost that dazed look. “Aaron won’t like being at the hospital. Plus, I don’t know how look it’ll take. I could be there a couple of hours, or I could be there for the rest of the night. You never know with these things…” She turned to look out the window again. “A baby, imagine that… Where does the time go? On, I guess.” Her voice was just above a whisper at the end.

“But I don’t want to watch him tonight.” Jason’s voice almost breached that unacknowledged blanket of silence.

His mother whipped her head around and looked at her son, once again seeing him, “I have made my decision and that’s final. There are certain responsibilities that come with being the older sibling, and I expect you to carry them out whether you like them or not. Life is full of responsibilities and obligations that might inconvenience us.”

Tears filled Jason’s eyes. Something in what his mother said hurt, but he was not sure where the pain came from. All he knew was that her words hurt beyond what he expected.

His mother pointed at some money on the table, “Here’s twenty dollars to order pizza for you and your brother. I expect change.” At this, she stood up and walked away from the table, leaving Jason standing in the kitchen.

A minute or two later, just long enough for him to compose himself, Jason walked back into the living room, through the hallway and into the last bedroom on the left: his bedroom. He closed the door and sat on his bed.

Like many teenage boys, Jason’s room existed in a state of organized chaos most of the time. The few pieces of furniture were hardly more than holding stations for various items. The top of the dresser, while containing jumbled masses of clothes within its drawers, was littered with even more clothes—some not quite so clean, but wearable without being offensive. The desk held stacks of schoolbooks and even higher stacks of papers and folders, yet an old computer rested in valley of school things. A bookshelf rested against a wall; its shelves bowed with the effort of holding books shoved into every available space. The bed looked more like a nest than something a human might find comfortable, with pillows and blankets scattered around a depression in the center. And dotting the floor here and there were the clothes considered too offensive for public wear, though not quite offensive enough for the hamper.

Jason sat on his bed for a few minutes, thinking about what his mother had said, thinking about his own reaction to the words “responsibilities” and “obligations.” He thought, Why had they hurt so much when she said them? A memory had stirred at that moment, something close to his discomfort with the mirror in the entryway.

He stood and moved toward the dresser with slow steps. Jason slid open the top drawer. Inside were all of his clean socks and underwear, but he needed neither at the moment. Instead, he pushed the socks aside and found what had drawn him to the dresser: a silver ring.

The ring was nothing special. There were no intricate designs, no splashes color from glittering jewels. It was a simple ring. But Jason hadn’t thought nor looked at the ring in a couple of years. Not since…

Jason slammed the drawer shut. He didn’t want to think about it.

The door to his bedroom opened, and Jason turned to see who was disturbing his quiet. It was his brother, Aaron, looking tentative, one foot in the room, the other in the hall. Like their mother, Aaron hardly spoke unless required to. And, indeed, he did have something to say.

“Mom’s about to leave.” With that, Aaron turned and left the bedroom, leaving the door open.
Frustrated and still stung by his mother’s words, by the memory he so wanted to forget, Jason stepped out of his room to say goodbye.