Chapter 4

I woke up badly. I had a skull-splitting headache, and my right arm was completely dead from the shoulder down. I had collapsed onto the couch in John David’s living room after he had pulled out a spare blanket and pillow and showed me where the bathroom was. I must not have moved at all once I was out. I rolled over on my back and tried to move my arm. The slightest movement sent nails through my head and my eye sockets felt like they were filled with very warm liquid. My eyeballs must have melted from all the hoodie magic.

I groaned from the pain and the embarrassment of falling for last night. My shoulder decided to voice its displeasure by beginning to regain sensation and prickling needles spread down my arm to my fingertips. Holy crap, this was the one of the worst combinations of pain I think I had ever experienced. I forced myself to clench my dead hand and then stretched it out again. Then I began to flex my whole arm, tightening my muscles as much I could and holding for a three count before releasing. Every bit of tension released new pain into my skull, and the release only added more. I quit trying to get my arm to move and laid very still with my eyes closed. It felt like the pain was building to a crescendo and I began to writhe and twist on the couch, clutching my head in my working hand. I couldn’t think and I was having trouble breathing.

I must have been making a lot of noise, because suddenly John David burst into the living room, “Crap crap crap crap crap!” He ran over to me and placed his hand on my forehead. He kept repeating his mild oath as he left my side and I lost track of most of my sensations. I wasn’t aware of when he returned, but eventually I became aware that the electrified sandpaper scouring the inside of my skull was losing its potency. I eventually came to with my head between John David’s knees, flat on my back on the floor. I barely registered that someone was holding my feet and saying, “Get another tin. It’s working. He’s coming around.”

Hands were touching my head and my face. I tried to reach up and push them away. The exertion overwhelmed me and I sank back into nothing.

The next time I opened my eyes, I was in a bed. Not my bed. I didn’t know where I was. I didn’t care though, because I wasn’t in pain. My head felt slightly stuffy, but the obliterating migraine of earlier has gone and I actually felt pretty ok. I sat up and looked around the room. Next to me on the nightstand was an incense pot. I didn’t recognize the smell of the smoke. The wall paint was the neutral cream of mass-produced cheap apartments. There were dark maroon curtains hanging over the windows, and I could see on the floor at the foot of the bed a large black square rug that looked like a fluffy cloud. The bed was a double, and it was more comfortable than my dorm bed. It was shoved in one corner of the room opposite the sliding closet doors. The blankets weren’t thick, but there were at least 5 of them. Most likely just picked up from where ever the owner could find a blanket that fit the bed. The two pillows didn’t match.

On the desk in opposite the corner of the room, there was a laptop that was open to a video streaming service with some soft music coming through the hardware speakers. Some textbooks were stacked on the shelf next to the desk. A box fan was propped up on the desk blowing over me.

I took all of this in in a moment but still had no idea where I was. I carefully moved to get out of bed, but I didn’t feel any pain so I stood up. I looked back at the bed and grimaced. I must have been sweating a lot. I could see my outline perfectly enshrined in gross relief. I also finally realized I wasn’t wearing a shirt. Or the same pants I had on previously. I was wearing basketball shorts that were a little too big for me. I snatched at them to hold them up. Anger started to build up inside of me. Who had taken my clothes off?

With one hand keeping my new wardrobe preserving my decency, I stepped to the door and cracked it open slightly. My nerves were finally awake and I suddenly felt anxious as well as angry. I looked outside and John David, Rockett, and Hannah were all sitting in the living room just outside of the bedroom. She noticed the door moving and quickly stood up from the couch.

“Oh my God, you’re finally awake!”

John David and Rockett jumped up from their seats and moved towards the door, following Hannah.

“How are you feeling?” Hannah asked, stopping just outside the door. She looked up into my face and I could read the worry and fear there. The same was written on Rockett’s. John David looked embarrassed as well.

I found I didn’t know what to say first. What came out was, “Why am I naked?”

“What?” Hannah asked. She looked back at the two behind her.

“He’s not naked, I put shorts on him,” John David replied. “Rockett helped. He was sweating so much his clothes were soaked. And he threw up.”

I wanted the floor to open up and swallow me. All of my anger disappeared in a flash. Most of it, anyway. “What happened?”

“You, well, it’s been a long day hasn’t it? You’ve slept through most of this one. John David, get him a shirt and let’s all sit down. I’ll get you something to drink,” Hannah spoke and everyone obeyed. Rockett led me to the couch like I was a newborn giraffe, and John David appeared with a shirt that was also too big for me across the shoulders, but at least it didn’t droop down to my knees like a little kid. Hannah called out from the kitchen. “Are you lactose intolerant?”

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

I replied that I wasn’t, and she appeared shortly after carrying glasses of chocolate milk. “Don’t laugh. Chocolate milk has a lot of great restorative properties, high in calcium, vitamin D, and some of the other essential minerals. Now sip it.”

I took my glass from her and she sat next to me on the couch. John David was standing next to his bedroom door and Rockett was in the recliner by the window. Everyone sipped from their glasses, and I couldn’t help it. I burst out laughing. The whole situation was absurd.

They all watched me, but I couldn’t help myself. I just laughed harder. Hannah took my glass of chocolate milk out of my hands so I wouldn’t spill it and sat there with a patient look on her face. I wiped the tears from my eyes and she offered my glass back. I sipped from the glass as instructed.

“So, magic hoodie feedback?” I finally offered.

Her eyebrows raised and she opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. John David shifted on his feet and Rockett finally spoke, “Well, yeah. More or less. But to be honest, we’ve never seen anything that strong before. For all of us, we slept about half the day, then woke up with a bad headache that eventually just went away on its own. Tylenol didn’t put a dent in it. We later discovered information about some herbalist type concoctions that have basically been a cure-all for when we level up.”

I looked at Rockett and didn’t even know where to start. “So magic hoodie is real. You didn’t just drug me with cheesecake then.”

Rockett smiled, “No, but what a drug that would be. I have the last few pieces of it at my place if you want to look at them. But better be quick, because I was planning on crushing them later today.”

Hannah finally interjected, “Listen, first I’m sorry. We all are sorry. We really didn’t know that would happen. When we got our hoodies, like Rockett said, it was just a bad headache, but now we have a cure. Are you sure you feel OK?”

“Yeah, physically I feel fine. Metaphysically, I’m still not sure this is actually happening.”

“Yeah, we kind of picked up on that. You talk in your sleep,” John David said.

I looked over at him, “I do?”

“Oh yes. ‘Magic hoodie wearing, night vision having, acrobat people!’ Then you actually growled. That’s why you only have shorts on. I wasn’t going to risk getting bitten by being too close.”

“Oh. Yeah, um…thanks, by the way. Speaking of my clothes, where are they?”

“In the dryer.”

“Magic hoodie too?”

“Yes, ‘magic hoodie’ too.”

“How come no one is wearing them right now?”

“Because they’re in the wash as well. ‘Magic hoodies’ can still smell like they’ve been running around the woods eating cheesecake at two in the morning.”

“Oh. Thanks again, John David.”

“No problem.”

Hannah pushed my glass of chocolate milk back up to my face. “Make sure you finish this. And if you’re feeling up for it, when you can get dressed, how about we go answer a lot more of your questions? Make the metaphysical line up a bit more with the physical.”

I heard a singsong beep of what had to be the dryer coming from a closet by the kitchen entrance. I drained my glass in one large gulp and said, “Let’s boogie!”

I took my still warm clothes to John David’s room and got dressed, taking a moment to ponder how I felt that another man had washed and dried my boxers. The others were waiting by the front door where I was handed my hoodie.

“How do you know whose is whose?” I asked as we stepped out onto the third-floor balcony. They all looked exactly the same. I could see the sun setting over the football stadium. It struck me that today was Friday and I had missed all of my classes. I doubted “magical hoodie feedback” was going to be an acceptable excuse.

“The hoodies?” Rockett asked. “Largely due to the sizes.”

“Oh, yeah,” I mumbled. That made sense.

They didn’t pull their hoodies up, and I trailed behind a few steps as we began the short walk back towards campus. John David fell back to keep pace with me and the other two pulled ahead, giving us some privacy.

“Hey man, I just want to clear the air. I really hope you are OK with me changing you. You really were a mess.”

I took a moment to answer. “I’ll be honest, it’s not my favorite thing. But I understand why it happened. You said Rockett helped?”

“Yeah.”

“So now both of you are jealous of me, huh?”

“Oh, you turd!” He burst out laughing and gave me a one-armed shove that almost forced me completely off the sidewalk with its power.

I tried to shove him back and all I accomplished was bouncing off of him. Wow, he was a brick house. I made several more attempts to even jostle him, but he was so quick that even if he wasn’t twice my weight, I doubted I could have even ruffled his hair. He put me in a headlock and noogied me. I tapped out.

As we walked past the sports arenas, where the football, baseball, and women’s softball stadiums were, I found myself comfortable enough to start peppering John David with questions. “How did they get their hoodies? Did someone do some weird cheesecake hazing to them? They had said there were other enhancements besides the five physical senses. So was John Willie psychic? What other enhancements were there?”

John David just kept saying variations of, “You’ll see. Just wait. Dude, we are taking you to the answer place now!”

We crossed the walking bridge that arced over the railroad skirting the edge of the academic campus on one side and the student apartments on the other. I got caught up in my own internal monologue about how gross the freshmen dorms were after being in John David’s apartment, and realized that we were at the foot of Wiley Tower. The 11-story white brick monolith rose high into the air, and I knew from my few ventures off campus that it could be seen from almost anywhere in the surrounding town.

We walked up the marble stairs and entered into the library’s first floor. Hannah waved at the librarian behind the desk and got a smile and a wave in return. John David and Rockett did as well. I gave a small wave, and I got a small nod back. They led me to the elevators and Hannah pushed floor nine.

“Hey, that’s where I go to study.”

“I know. That’s how we first saw you,” Hannah kept her eyes on the digital numbers slowly climbing until with a ding, the doors opened to a familiar sight. Glass covered display cases showed antique books and collections. The smell of old papers and musty, disused shelves filled my nostrils. It seemed especially strong tonight. My nose twitched. Everyone pulled their hoods on. I did too.

I followed at the back of the line as they wound through the stacks. We were heading away from the side of the floor I usually studied on. I guess I hadn’t explored as well as I thought, because I didn’t recognize any of the display cases we were passing now. I had an idea and I pulled my hood down. The entire floor changed right before my eyes, with shelves and cases I now knew coming into view. That did it for me.

I freaked out.