Theo and George

Just a little somethin' somethin' I felt like writing one day. Don't take it too seriously.

“George! Georgie, please!” Theodora Gray called out to her younger brother who thrashed about on his narrow bed, the sheets tangling with his limbs. She tried to hold him down by the arms, her hands clamped around his thin wrists, but his legs still flailed. Theo sat down on his knees and called out his name once more, hoping to wake him from yet another violent nightmare. George still struggled against his sister’s weight, but failed to throw her off of him; he was only ten.

George’s nightmares were weighing heavily on Theo’s nerves. She could never blame him for them, but she let herself admit that life would be better without them. But, then again, without his prophetic nightmares, George would be sent to the South, and neither sibling would survive without one another.

“Stop it!” George cried out in his sleep, his voice high and hoarse from screaming. “Stop the lightning! It hurts!”

“George, there is no lightning,” Theo told him soothingly, noticing his body begin to tire. “Wake up, there is no lightning.”

Theo was right. There was no lightning. Not in the real world, anyhow. But there was sure to be. George’s nightmares always came true. He was a prophet. Gifted with extra sensory perception. He had such potential in that frail, little body of his. Underneath that mop of hay-colored hair lay a brain in which workings far beyond the intelligence of others whirred. There lay maps and blueprints of technology yet to be dreamed of. Theo could never hope to understand it.

George’s brown eyes flashed open and darted about in their sockets wildly until they came to rest on Theo’s gentle and perceptibly relieved face, covered in a thin sheen of sweat. He sighed and his muscles relaxed under the weight of his sister. “Theo,” he wheezed.

“Yes, George,” she murmured, with a conspicuous degree of weariness covering her soft voice. She moved off of his legs and removed her hands from his wrists, kneeling down beside his bed. “Do you know where you are?” The conversation after his nightmares was quickly becoming routine.

“Home,” he answered.

Theo stoically nodded, her Cupid’s bow lips set in a straight line. “Yeah. You’re home.”

George had only been a baby during the year of the Revolt. Theo had been six. It wore on her spirit to have to care for her infant brother at such a young age; she barely knew what to do. He would have been dead at the time if a fifteen-year-old girl named Christine had not shown up like an angel and helped her. And by the time George was four, Christine was banned from Puretown at the age of nineteen, leaving ten-year-old Theo weeping in her absence. She didn’t know where Christine went. She didn’t know where anyone went when they were exiled. She didn’t know where she would go in three years.

She didn’t know what George would do without her.

Theo had been a bright child. A prodigy. The pride of the Gray family. Maria and Jorge moved from New York to the city of Hevill, now known as Puretown, seventeen years prior. They were overwhelmed with joy when they discovered their daughter had mastered Spanish and English by the age of four. Theo made straight A’s in school and was destined for greatness. Until the Revolt.

Having such a sensitive mind, Theo learned how to make things appear as if they were real when they weren’t. She gleaned this gift by accident when she willed a bad grade on a spelling quiz to be a good one and the red C on the page blurred and became an A. Since then, she had tried to make these illusions as often as she could. The biggest illusion she had made was one for George, to show him what his mother and father looked like. She willed two mannequins in the front of a rundown clothing store to be perfect mimics of their parents.

George loved that. George loved when Theo made the thick layer of dust covering the floor of their home into lush, green grass and the moths into fluttering, twittering birds. She also found that she could deceive many minds at a time. If she made a broken, wooden chair into a throne for George to play on, nine or so others viewing said chair would see the grand masterpiece Theo derived from fairy tale picture books.

And now, when George scratched himself bloody during one of his nightmares, Theo made the scabs disappear to his eyes so that he would let them heal and not pick them. She often willed away the fights that occurred before them so that if any blood were shed, George would not see it. Theo would be damned if the savage children of Puretown would disrupt her little brother’s mind any more.

George was insane. Many in Puretown were. It was the fault of those who revolted that the poor boy flailed about in his sleep at the sights and sounds and smells of his vivid prophecies of war within the city. Any time Theo saw a group of thugs roaming the streets, the anger boiled within her like magma and she deceived their minds to not catch sight of her and George. They could go by unnoticed if Theo pleased.

But not all of the occupants of Puretown were bad. Some had become Theo’s friends. She had seen and spoken with Charlie Bennet from the South on many occasions when he came to visit Jessie, a girl whose mind was just as troubled as George’s. Charlie, as most referred to him as, was a nice young man. Handsome too. Theo had even developed somewhat of a crush on him, but did not wish to dwell on it. If she were a normal sixteen-year-old girl, crushes would be something of a familiarity. But for Theo Gray, it was not anything she could tax her attention on.

Though, it would help if she had an extra pair of hands to help her with George. And Jessie would be more than welcome to come over.

Theo was wrenched from her thoughts by George’s whisper: “Lightning in the North.”

“Really? Do you know when, Georgie?” Theo asked, softly, her blue-green eyes poring over young George’s now peaceful face.

George smiled. “No.”

Theo nodded. That smile was unnerving. George himself was often unnerving. But he was her little brother. He was the only thing she had left. She grinned back maternally and put her hand to the side of his face.

“Theo?”

“Yes, George?”

“Make the butterflies.”

Theo giggled and nodded. “Okay.” As she gazed into George’s eyes, her mind searched over his. Finding the neurons she needed to trick and the synapses she needed to betray, George would soon begin to see small yellow and black butterflies fluttering lazily about the dark room.

The boy let out a giggle that let Theo know her illusion was set. She let her brother chase the winged, fake beauties while laughing giddily as she made her way to the dirty window. Staring out from her house, the bleak twilight settled over Puretown like a dusty blanket. Night was upon them.

 

Author's Note

Give me the truth :)

Reviews

[Sara]

This is very thought provoking. I like the idea of being able to will away undesired things. Like mrowepat said, it would be interesting to see what happens further in the story, if there is any more to add to it. I'd like to know what happens with the lightning and if George has any more prophetic visions. Thankyou for the entertaining read!

[mrowepat]

This was a very interesting write, and well done. Is this part of a larger story? It could stand on it's own merit as a short story, but I want to know more about Puretown and the Revolution, why George and Theo have interesting abilities, and other silly things like if Theo and Charlie hook up. You've got some really interesting story lines available in this, if you wanted to expand on the idea. I think you should; it kept me interested all the way through. Good job Sa!!! Way to go!!!