living on a painting

                 Living in a painting

Shaniece foreman

Quick, I only have a limited amount of time to tell you this. If you are reading this you are already in danger.  Things go on in this world without any of us even knowing something maybe has altered the course of our lives.  For example have you ever had déjà vu? Well, we all have a little bit of a psychic conniption; in some it is stronger than in others. The ones who have it in abundance notice it at a young age when they are their most innocent, they are called the  Gova and they control all of the other people who you thought where no more than fictional creatures, but you don't know how wrong you really are. There are many creatures that you may know, like vampires, wizards, witches, werewolves, and a biblical creature called Leviathan, but off of that subject, I’m getting ahead of myself.

Many years have gone by since that fateful night in France at Paris's Musée d'Art Moderne. When I first went there it felt like the exhibits eyes were watching me as if I was the one who had stolen the paintings.  If you do happen to go then just don't touch anything for I fear that the worst will be coming after you.  My name is Tenchi Ami  I am 18 and still running from things that I cannot mention in fear of being found.

CHAPTER 1

I Fall into a Trance

Before I tell you this story I have to tell you that I swear -a lot. But for now, we will just have to start at the beginning, the first night.

When I was 15 I wasn’t the best kid you would ever want to meet. I had been taken to the police station a few times for just being at the wrong place at the wrong time but the most prominent and the one that really stuck out and is essential to understanding what is happening to me now is the time I was taken in for supposedly vandalizing town property. When I was 10 and, this kid from my school, Jarred, tagged the front of a town sign that said “Graffiti is a Crime!” and he tagged it to f*ckin say “Graffiti is a Fun Crime!”   And I happened to be there and I was telling him about this girl that liked me, “Even, Jake, her brother told me she likes me.” I said “OK, well then get her to tell you in person and tell me too and I will believe you” he joked “Fine I will” and right then we heard sirens so we ran as fast as we could and he being the fastest in our school was and got away, I on the other hand had to ran into a comic shop where they sell books in different languages like Spanish and French, and others from all over the world. So, since I was running through the f*ckin store, the store clerk stared to yell at me in Chinese, and when you look back on it was pretty funny. Then I looked over his shoulder and saw a man who must have been his boss but, when his boss looked at me I saw the most gorgeous face that I have ever seen and, still haunts me to this day, and I was like oh, sh*t.

So I turned and ran out of the store. When I turned out of the door I ran into a old lady, who looked like she could bake you cookies and still have time to f*ck you up, so I f*ckin fell but, I got up and ran to the corner store where I hung out with my friends on the weekends and when I walked in I went to the candy isle because, who expects and any adult to be there, right, wrong. So, as turned the corner to see the of the man who was the boss at the store,  just standing there looking at me like he had been waiting for hours and secretly I felt like I owed him an apology not for running through his store and disrupting his customers, but for making him wait. But I was so freaked that I couldn’t move anything or talk the second after I laid eyes on each other I felt like everything would be okay like I was eating fresh baked cookies like my mom used to make when I was little, before she... well any ways when the police finally got there and I was hand cuffed, told my rights, and when the man finally left  I could think straight, it was like I had been in some kind of dream, no- not a dream a trance. When I arrived at the police station I was pretty pissed that my friend let me take the fall but I let it go and I decided that I wouldn’t snitch on him. But, after about an hour they came in with the can of spray paint that Jarred used but when they checked the prints on the can my prints didn't match up so they let me go. Funniest sh*t ever!

So any way back to the night of the “Telling”, I was staying at my gramps’ house out in San Francisco. I love his house because it is always a little messy like he just had a “small get together”. It is a little three bedroom house with a big a** backyard. He came from Japan when he was about seventeen and when he was twenty two he met my grandmother, Somi, they got married, yadda yadda, and had my dad when they were just married.  And they are now divorced and so are my parents who had kinda the same story but not with the coming from another country and the getting married first part but basically the same. So, anyways I was staying at my Gramps house and I was watching Degrassi you know the episode where Jane and Spinner ... he well any way, I was watching a show when I heard a crash coming from the kitchen and I smelt smoke so I jumped up like the cops were knockin on my door and I ran as fast as I could to see what was going on when I was just outside of the door way I heard talking, I heard gramp’s voice but then I also heard a voice their I didn't know but it was familiar like it was out of a dream or my past.

The Stranger sounded like he made a step closer to gramps ”They need to start his training !” you could tell that he was trying to keep his voice in a whisper but was failing and I was thinking “Oh, sh*t is that, Trey Johnson, from the Lakers”   Gramps sounded like he was getting angry which is rare for him,  “you gave up the right to speak for him a long time ago”   Now, mind you this is all going down in Japanese but I’m translating for you.

So I’m calling him Trey now so Trey sounded l “Fine then, Shingei, it is your decision and your responsibility but I will be watching. “

By now I’m thinking “Trey Johnson wants me to train with him and Gramps is saying, NO!?”

I walked into the room ready to yell at gramps but when I looked at the man he looked so familiar, like I had known him for my whole life and, no I don’t know Trey Johnson, but when I saw him it was like I wanted to go and be where ever he was, wait that sounds wrong, but I mean it was like I needed him to approve of me.

And he just stood there and looked at me for what felt like five min then, there was a loud sound of wind, and he was gone. And, I stood there like I had, had this epic experience and I had just got back in two seconds. But then I looked at the floor.

Gramps had always looked like he had never spent a day out of the sun, he is always so tan and he has a little bit of wrinkles which is good because he is really old but he never told me is real age he always said that it was somewhere between thirty and thirty thousand.(f*cker)  

When I looked at gramps he was gasping for air like he was having a heart attack on the floor. So, I picked him up and when to leave the kitchen and the house but, as I turned the corner my older sister Amaya (we call her Maya), who is usually very quiet, came running down the stairs screaming like, well, like the house was on fire, and Gramps was passed out. So, she was askin all these stupid questions that to me really didn't matter at the time like, why is the house on fire and why I’m not wearing any shoes. SO once we got outside and the fire dept. came and gramps was taken to the hospital we were taken to grandma’s house, my dad’s mom. Her house is in California too about twenty miles from Gramps’ house and her house is a colonial style of a house, and it looks like any elderly lady’s home.

When we got into the house she was hysterical and crying her eyes out until we gave her a hug and then she quieted a little bit but not enough so that she could talk and be understood. After I brewed her a nice cup of Sleepy Time tea she finally was able to speak.

“What happened?”  She looked as if she was going to be angry at what i said no matter what I said so i was like “nothin”, just kidding, but I didn’t want to tell her about the random guy standing over gramps but something inside of me told me to tell her everything, and i knew Charlie was listening because she wasn’t there. So after I explained she got really quite, you know how people say to be as quite as church mice well church mice had nothing on grandma. So, after about five minutes she looked at me and said “Go up to the attic and get the box that says ‘junk’ and bring it to me.”  

CHAPTER 2

I GO INTO THE LOOKING GLASS

I went up the stairs past the hall full of painting that looked like they were from the medieval times. i felt like the people in the paintings were just staring at am accusingly like I had done something. But of course at the time i didn't know how right i was. when i got to the attic it was freezing and it felt haunted. As i looked for the box i noticed a lot of pictures of Gramps and Grandma when they were still together, they looked happy as they took a ride on the swan boats. In one picture Gramps was bald, i had to do a double take and kind of looked like a Buddhist monk even though we are Christian, and there was this guys standing next him and he looked like his teacher, but I disregarded it. When I found the box and took it down stairs past the creepy looking wall art, but as i was walking down the hall i felt a surge of power coming from the box. It feels like a tingling sensation going up your spinal cord and through our whole body coming out of you r fingers.  

When i opened the box i started to get a little bit scared not only because of the surge of power but because I was still in the halls with all of the creepy paintings. inside of the box was a very large very old book and something told me it wasn't for holding up grandmas coffee table. so, took it out to read it, but below it was three wands just like that creepy vanishing guy had. I stood their in shock, I was in rage because i knew that we had to be something like him (I decided to not like him because his actions made Gramps have a heart attack and nearly die) but i couldn't go down stairs and tell grandma about the random creepy guy. So,  i calmly fixed myself and put the book back inside of the box along with the wands.but just as i was putting a lid on the box, I saw a shadow flicker out of the corner of my eye so being well, me, i followed it. So around three corners, down some stairs and into a room I had never been into before.

It was amazing it was kind of like a big library/ laboratory, it had bottles of liquids and rocks and lots of book, and when I say lots i mean about 200 large book cases filed with them, and lastly a weird mirror. I had to check out my super sexy self and i smiled. But it felt like some thing had pushed me so I tried to lean on the mirror for balance but my hand just went through. And by this time i was mentally cussin so i wont share that with you but,  I poked my toe in and i was sucked into another room with  things from all over the world, and I was on an island in a beach house. So, what did i do?  I explored, ha ha, since i was in a bedroom with the mirror I walked in to the adjoining bathroom and when i tell you it was cool I mean it was to good to be true. Now I'm not one for small and cozy but this one was both It was a metallic blue with a bath big enough to fit three people and comfortably. On the walls were pictures of sea birds and all other beach things. Above the crisp, nice, and normal sink was another mirror but when i tried to put my finger through it nothing happened it was a normal mirror.

I went out of the bedroom and down the hall and into another room decorated modernly which after the bathroom was kind of nice. it had white walls and it had different colored paints splattered all over the walls, greens, blues, reds, pinks, yellows, maroons, purples, and turquoise. The bed was the same green as the paint on the walls, and it was right next to the door and the wall. But that was it , but on the walls was a panel of buttons. So, i pushed the one that said multi color, and to my amazement, the walls started shifting and the colors started to blend slowly and it made me feel dizzy so i pushed the stop button. And, this time, I pushed the food button , cause i was starving.

A large touch screen popped up in the middle of the wall next to the bed and it said to type in a type of food. So I typed in McDonald's, then it showed a menu from the restaurant and said to pick my meal. So, I picked a Ranch BLT, mmmmmmm... Then a slot popped out of the wall just below the screen and on it was the Ranch BLT that i wanted. Oh, sh*t!!

    Then I wanted to nom nom on some chips so I went through the same process and out popped some chips. So I sat on the bed and ate the chips and by then i was feeling full and I was absolutely sure that I would not be the one to tell grandma about this and just as i was thinking this guess who walked in.. your mom jk lolz, Grandma.

CHAPTER 3

I LEARN THE SECRETS OF THE AMI CLAN

Yo, i almost choked on a chip. the only reason that she scared me so much because I didn’t hear her come in. She stood there and looked at me like she knew that I was there since i first walked in. “What are you doing in here?” I twitched like she had just slapped me i guess it was because i thought that she was going to. “Well, i saw a shadowy figure and followed it and this is where it led me.” “Well it doesn’t matter now lets just go down stairs.” We, walked out of the room and down the creepy hall way with all of the paintings (still staring) as i did it felt like i was getting more and more tired, and eventually we walked into the living room. And there stood a guy about 20-24 years old nd not to sound wrong but he was good looking cause i know some of you trolls will be all tenchi your gay. But, I’m not so any ways, he was sitting there chatting up my sister and i walk in and it is like all of the tension that i should be feeling evaporated like smoke.

I looked at him and he stared at me like, i don’t know, like he could kick my ass if he wanted to. But, couldn’t get mad or even a little angry.  Also, he was acting like he could make my sister want to be with him with the flick of a finger. But, it felt like some thing inside of me just broke but I was still held in this annoying field of serenity.

So I calmly sat down in the living room next to grandma. we sat there in silence accept for the talking that was going on, in the couch opposite me, which i was successfully drowning out.  They just sat there talking about things that i didn't even care about like; school and work.  So, after about 10 minuets of just sitting there they finally turned and looked at me. The random guy spoke first in a calm voice with an undertone of sarcasm or like he was talking to a toddler,  “Hello, my name is Dell Mathews. I am from an organization to help children like you. You’re special!” But really he was saying “Hi, my name is Dell. I have come to take you way because you are retarded and mentally incapable of operating in society.” So, I turned to Grandma with a look of confusion,”Why is he here?” She stared into the distance for what seemed like a hour.  So, i took this opportunity to stare into space and day dream, I day dreamed about “Dell” falling in to a black abyss and being eaten by THE CRACKEN!!! Then by the hulk! (yea my imagination is weird.)

“Okay, I will tell you.  Your family had gone back for many generations.  Back before the time of cell phones or iPod’s or even cars. Your great great great great great ...Grandfather Shingei Geiami was the first to notice... and experiment with things. And, many others after him have tried to accomplish the same thing that he was trying to gain, immortality. But one after another they all have gone over to the dark side.” she stared at me with such intensity that I had to look away and feel guilty.

“They were experimenting with some thing do you know what it was?” she asked and looked as if she could stare into my soul. I thought for a moment, back to the previous events that happened thought out the day, back to the guy that disappeared, to the hall way,  and to the mirror and the events that took place there. The wands, the book, and all of the things that I have experienced during my life time. Back to the nights when lighting would scare me when i was 8 and how if i concentrated really hard some times the storm would stop and i could sleep peacefully for he rest of the night. Or how i could just automatically understand technology and do wonders with a cell phone.  and then it all clicked, but i stayed looking at the wall for another two seconds just to add suspense. “He was experimenting with magic!” “Yea, about time this dip sh*t found out” my head snapped up to look at the person who said it expecting it to be Dick, I mean Dell but instead it was  Maya. I was disconcerted when i heard this. in all  of the years that i have known her she had always been so quiet and nice but when she said that it hurt and it was very...odd. and mentally i had to make excuses for her so i decided that it was Dell and his presence that made her act this way and that is i could gt rid of him she would act in a nicer way and that i could get rid of this side of her before it takes over. so my plan is to ignore him so i wont get too angry.  

But then i looked at Maya, as i looked into her eyes i could see something that looked like shame or, no, not shame but