Definition: A change agent is an event, organization, material thing or, more usually, a person that acts as a catalyst for change.

Chemystery, by Karin Bishop

Part 1

May 15

I don’t know why I’m writing this; something just made me want to start a journal. I’m not doing it for any class or anything; Mom didn’t tell me to do it or even hint at it. I just have this …feeling that I should write down things.

Since it’s my journal I should say something about myself. They say that people who keep journals or diaries look back years later and are surprised by what they thought ‘way back when’.

So I guess that’s why I’m doing this.

Okay, personal details. We had to keep a journal for one semester so I kind of know the things that are supposed to be up front, descriptions and such. My name is Christopher Hanson, and I live with my mom Ruth in a little house on the edge of the housing development. It’s all forest behind us. I’m kind of short and have long light brown hair. I tried to grow it long so I’d look, I don’t know, like a rocker, maybe. So it’s always tied back in a ponytail. I go to West View Middle School, finishing up the seventh grade. I’m an okay student, B’s mostly. I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.

My best friends are …well, my only friends, really, are Craig Wesson and Tommy Donohue. Craig is the smart one of us three, always planning, always coming up with schemes in the name of fun. He’s average height, I guess, with wavy sandy hair and likes to wear black a lot. Tommy’s a big guy, all action, fighting Irish and all that. Short black hair and as many muscles as a fourteen-year-old can have–even more than some seventeen-year-olds. So Craig and Tommy are the brains and brawn, which makes me the follower, I guess. The third musketeer, whatever. I don’t mind, because they’ve always watched out for me.

That’s because I’m …well, not short, really, like I said before. Not like a runt; there are guys shorter than me. I’m the shortest of my buddies, but that’s okay. So, not short, but I’m just small. Small all over. Thin bones, skinny legs, that sort of thing. Not Little People small, just on the lower end of the bell curve for my age, according to Dr. Paulson. He’s been my doctor since forever. No, wait. After my father left us, right after I started kindergarten, I think was when we started going to Dr. Paulson. So nearly forever.

My father left us. Those four words say it all. For awhile I thought it was something I’d done or hadn’t done; I think all kids think that way. Then I thought it was all Mom’s fault and I wasn’t nice about it. But now I think he left us. A little of both, and a lot of him. Mom says he’s a traveling salesman now so I can’t write him, and I’ve kind of lost interest in doing it, anyway. He’d worked at a supermarket, and worked in a church, so I guess he just drifts. I’m fine with it being just me and Mom. She works in the administration at St. Joseph’s Hospital and is a really nice lady. I just think she’s lonely, only having me.

So back to Tommy and Craig. Because I have a feeling this journal’s going to have a lot about them. We met in second grade. I was going through some of my nastiness with Mom about my father leaving, raging and being a jerk, and mouthed off to the wrong kid at school who clocked me. I mean, I never saw it coming until I was staring at the sky, dizzy. Then there was a blur and this voice yelling, ‘Get off the little guy’ and that was Tommy rescuing me from a fifth grader that had decked me. Meanwhile, Craig picked me up and the three of us have been friends ever since.

I said that Craig’s the brains of the outfit. He’s always coming up with something for us to do. I don’t mean like, ‘Hey, let’s go to the playground and hang out’ types of things to do. I mean things like, ‘Hey, I know a place where we can get a block of ice for less than a buck. Stick a cardboard box on it and ride it down the hills at the golf course.’ That was a wild ride, let me tell you, just insanely fast! Then the golf course security guys came rolling up in golf carts–what else?–and busted us. But it was fun, Craig was right about that.

Some of his ideas, though, are a little dicey. Mom and I have this …thing about honesty, being honest and speaking the truth. So when Craig comes up with something that might be illegal I beg off, and that’s usually enough for him to spike the idea and come up with something else. I don’t mean illegal ideas like stealing something, or hurting somebody. Just things that are a little out there. A little …off..

***

Okay. I’m back. It’s later, but I want to get this thing started right. I just have this uneasy sense that the whole world is off, somehow. I don’t mean teenage angst, either. We learned about that in class the other day. Anyway, I’m going into the whole Tommy and Craig thing because it’s all part of …the off-ness.

Three weeks ago, Craig had another of his ideas that was maybe a tiny bit over the illegal line but too enticing to pass up. The tiny bit was that it didn’t involve breaking and entering, just trespassing. And then, as he pointed out, only if we got caught.

Right.

Like I said, some things Craig came up with were a little off.

But the enticing part was too good to miss. There’s an industrial park on the far side of the forest, just a featureless rambling monstrosity of huge anonymous beige buildings. Craig had some supposedly very good info that video games were made in one of the buildings. And not just video games, but that it was the headquarters of Intellia, the guys that make Omega Chronicles, the ultimate, ultimate video game. It’s like the big brother mashup of Gears of War and Halo, only on steroids. And Halo was made in an anonymous building right next to a supermarket outside Seattle, so Intellia could very well be in our industrial park! Craig’s plan was to try to slip in and see what we could see. Not to take anything–although I brought a little digital camera–but to find out about the new version if we could. Just getting in would allow us to score over all the other gamers we knew.

I’m not totally into the games like Craig and some other guys. Tommy’s not very good at them; he usually gets too angry and winds up throwing the controller. I’m not like that; I just don’t get into them like other guys. Maybe because Mom and I are always reading, and I like to watch old movies. Well, any movies, but I really love the old ones. But I was sure aware of the gamer world, and if we could pull this off, the street cred we’d get would be massive and we’d roll into eighth grade next year as heroes.

So we did it.

Craig had been watching the place for a week before. He actually set up an old movie camera and let it record for six hours at a time and scanned what time people came and went. Then he targeted those hours and after a week of his surveillance we had a pretty good schedule. There was a way to slip in the loading area, he said, when the waste guys came for the dumpster. I asked about getting out, and Craig laughed and said locks are only to keep people from getting in, not keep people from going out. That made sense …sorta.

We did the thing of telling our moms that we were all at each other’s houses, or in transit, so we had a few hours’ time to skulk around. We hid where Craig had filmed from, and used the dumpster truck for cover to scamper alongside and sure enough the dock gate opened up and we were in, and scrambled around keeping everything between us and anybody watching the process and then crouched behind the now-empty dumpster. Craig pointed out the button on the wall that opened the gate, if we needed it. He’s sharp like that.

The gate closed and we grinned as the lights went off. Then we crept onto the loading dock and the door had a glass window. We scanned through it and then slipped in. Here was the dicey part; we didn’t know what was inside so we had to move fast and improvise. It was a featureless hall with doors; most seemed to have the glass insert so we could peek in. The first three had people in them and the fourth was empty and unlocked. I’d shot photos–without a flash–of the halls and through the corners of the windows as quickly as I could, and then followed the other guys into the room.

The room had eight amazing computer workstations, with three monitors each surrounding ergonomic keyboards, all with screen savers going with the Intellia logo. I shot that as Tommy and Craig posed high-fiving each other in back of the screens. Craig tried each station but they all had password protection. We went back to the window and saw somebody walking down at the end of the hall. We shrank back to the walls, which was kind of silly when I think about it. The guy’s footsteps stopped briefly in front of our door and I thought my heart stopped when the doorknob turned and the door opened an inch. Then it closed and we heard a key slipping in the lock and the footsteps started away.

Tommy started to mutter something but Craig whispered that it was just a routine guard thing, and he found an unlocked lab so he locked it; that was all. He grinned and reminded us that it wasn’t to keep people from going out …

…and then he was proved wrong. We couldn’t get the door opened. It was somehow locked on both sides. We sat at separate workstations and debated what to do. Craig said no problem and pulled out his cellphone but there weren’t any bars so we looked at each other, wondering just how much trouble we were in.

Then The Voice began.

“Stay calm, boys,” came a disembodied, deeply male voice. “We’ll get you out in a moment.” There was a pause. “Stand up.”

Craig and I stood; Tommy looked at us with disgust.

“You, too,” The Voice said to a startled Tommy, who quickly stood. “Yes, we have cameras. We’ve monitored you since the loading dock. Now, there’s no need for this to be ugly. You guys thought you’d sneak in, get some cool photos to show to your buddies and be heroes, right?”

It was strange nodding to an unseen voice, but we did.

The Voice actually chuckled. “We understand. Okay. Help’s here. Stand by the door and no hassles, big guy, okay?” I guessed that the hidden camera or cameras had shown Tommy getting in a defensive crouch. He looked at us and then loosened up.

The door clicked and a bearded guy with black curly hair and a dark blue polo shirt with the Intellia logo stood there with two other guys in the same getup.

“Come on, guys,” Bearded Guy sighed. Like this was an everyday occurrence, he said matter-of-factly, “You’re not the first and you probably won’t be the last that tried this stunt. Let’s make this as painless as we can, okay?”

I’d been freaked by The Voice but what he said now relaxed me a little; Craig, too, I think. We meekly followed them to another room with several chairs and a computer workstation and we sat.

Bearded Guy said, “Any ID?” and we looked at each other, knew we were screwed and fished out our wallets and handed them over. He grinned. “Well, you’re not the first but you’re certainly the youngest, I’ll give you points for that.” He made photocopies of our ID cards, those crummy handwritten ones that come with the wallet, and copies of our West View Middle School student IDs. Then he handed them back to us.

“Right. Craig, Thomas–go by Tommy?” On Tommy’s nod, to me he said, “Christopher–go by Chris?” I nodded and he gave another deep sigh. “Right. You know you’re trespassing, yada-yada-yada. No sense getting police records over this. Are all of you gamers?”

Craig said he was and Tommy nodded. I shrugged. Bearded Guy said, “Not a gamer, Chris? Why’d you risk the cops, then? For your buddies? Thought so. Oh, camera, please. Canon, was it?”

I nodded, impressed with their surveillance cameras, and handed it over. He pushed the buttons like he’d done it a zillion times and handed it back. Wiped clean, of course.

“Sorry if you had shots of your girlfriend there; she’s gone, too.”

Tommy snorted and Bearded Guy looked at me a little gently, I thought. “No girlfriend, then? Right. Well, you’re young yet. You guys …well, you know that you’ve found Intellia. But there’s a complication. Usually I’d let you back out the loading dock and that would be that …but you picked a bad night to show up.” He inhaled deeply and looked up. “And it’s Showtime,” he said to our puzzlement. Especially because he looked almost …sad.

We turned as the door was flung open and a guy came in, wearing mostly grays, even his windbreaker. From all the movies I’d seen, something about him said military or ex-military. And he was followed by two big guys in black who dwarfed everybody in the room. The other two Intellia guys probably felt that, because they quickly left without a word, leaving Bearded Guy looking kind of stranded. The two Bully Boys stepped on either side of Military Guy, flanking him. Only then did I see they were carrying what looked like big flashlights but were probably stun rods.

Military Guy stood looking at us for a moment and then surprised us by smiling. “Gentlemen. Points for bravado. But you understand that we can’t allow any trespassing. Now, I want you to know that I will not involve the police if you’ll answer some questions for me. Are we clear?”

We knew enough to say, ‘yes, sir’ and, as freaked as I was by the stun rods, I could tell Tommy and Craig were as relieved as I was that we could avoid police. We’d been grounded forever for the ice block-golf course thing.

“Fair enough,” he nodded. “We’ll move to another room, get out of this fellow’s hair.”

Bearded Guy gave us a quick frowning look and said, “Do you think it’s wise?”

Military Guy said crisply, “Already been decided.” To us, all smiley, he said, “You guys want something to drink? Soda? Juice?”

We looked at each other. They wouldn’t be offering drinks if we were really truly busted, right? So we started to smile–Craig was grinning.

Tommy said, “Pepsi if you got it.”

“Sprite. Or Seven-Up, something like that,” Craig said.

“I’m fine with water. Or juice,” I said.

“Health freak,” Tommy muttered.

“Excellent choices,” the guy said, and pulled out a walkie-talkie and relayed our requests. “Follow me.”

We got up and left Bearded Guy. I was the last in line and turned to sort of wave and saw that he was staring at us, and looked worried.

Military Guy led us down another featureless hall to another door like all the others. Inside was a table and three chairs, with our drinks set next to glasses with ice cubes and a napkin. Two opened cans of Pepsi and Sprite and a bottle of Dasani water with the cap next to it. Like a hotel, I thought, cool! We couldn’t be in that much trouble if we were getting like room service, right? There was a desk and computer and Military Guy sat there; the Bully Boys took chairs on either side of the door. I thought it was interesting that the room had been set up so precisely and quickly and anonymously. Maybe it was always like that.

The three of us sat by our drinks, Craig in the middle, and since Military Guy was silent, just watching us and nodding pleasantly, we went ahead and poured and sipped. After we’d swallowed and did the ‘ah!’ thing, he grinned, leaned forward and launched into a long speech about the need for secrecy, bootlegs giving new games a bad reputation, blah, blah, blah. It was all stuff we’d heard before or could figure out on our own, but I guess he thought he had to give the speech. I figured it was the price we had to pay for not involving the cops.

The speech ended, Military Guy fired up the computer and asked each of us what games we played, how old we were when we started playing video games, and other marketing-type questions that he entered, a page for each of us. He asked about our social lives, to flesh out the profile, I guess. He said it was to get a better grasp of gamers, and said the industry had learned a lot after the screw-up with Halo: Reach Again, and we all nodded, remembering that with a laugh.

Some of the questions were personal but they were personality data Military Guy said the marketing guys needed. And it would keep us from the cops. So we told him about our grades, girlfriends–that was easy: None–siblings and parents, what type of computer systems we used, what kind of internet feeds did we have, did we play online, that sort of thing. We’d finished the drinks long ago and Tommy said he had to whizz, one of his favorite words. Military Guy nodded and Tommy was escorted out by a Bully Boy. Craig and I looked at each other and Military Guy laughed.

“Look, we all got rules and protocols. I have to have one guy on the kid …whizzing, and one guy here. That way the head guys don’t get all freaked out that we let you wander alone, you understand?”

We did, and Craig went when Tommy came back. I sat there thinking, first Bearded Guy, now Military Guy, and he’s talking about Head Guys …how many layers were here? Although Military Guy didn’t sound like he actually had any Head Guys, from his attitude. Then Craig came back and I went. Boring hall to a restroom, like all the other doors but it had the male bathroom symbol where the little windows were on the other doors. Industrial plumbing, not unlike school but absolutely spotless–so not like school!–and then my Bully Boy and I went back to the room.

There was a little speech for the need to keep quiet, although we hadn’t really seen anything, and he’d see if maybe he could get the three of us an advance copy of the new game. It was obviously the bribe to keep our mouths shut.

The Bully Boys took us back to the loading dock, opened the gate, we walked through, the gate closed, and that was it, just like it never happened.

May 16

Whew! That took me hours to write yesterday, but I think it’s important to know every moment of our little adventure.

Because something is happening to me, and I think it’s because of that night, three weeks ago.

We got home and considered ourselves heroes, even if we couldn’t tell anybody what happened. And we’d never tell our buddies because we’d sound lame. They’d say: “Let me get this right. You say you snuck in to Intellia. You say they caught you, interrogated you, and conveniently wiped your camera. So, basically, you’ve got nothing.” Yeah, right; there was no point in telling anybody anything.

Three or four nights after that night, though, I felt …funny. I felt soft and kind of …squishy. There wasn’t anything to put a finger on; I figured I’d caught a cold that night because the timing was right if I was coming down with it. It passed the next day, and although I had a few sessions of diarrhea in the morning–thank goodness it was a teacher workday, no school–I felt fine afterwards. I went over to Craig’s house to hang out but was just kind of tired, I guess from all my time on the toilet. He just thought I was coming down with something and we didn’t do much; he was fiddling with Omega Chronicles while I read an old Rolling Stone, so I went home early.

It wasn’t until about a week later that I woke up in the middle of the night, sweating. I’d had a weird dream but couldn’t remember it; just a flash of images that made no sense. And the next night, and the next night.

It’s been two weeks now and I’m sleeping okay; I haven’t had a dream for two nights now. I still feel soft and squishy, though. But the reason I started writing all this is because of something Craig said.

The three of us were in the park, sitting on the merry-go-round. Just sitting, not doing anything, just talking. There weren’t any little kids around so it wasn’t like we were hogging it or anything; just hanging out. At some point Tommy said, “Man, I think I’m coming down with the flu or something. I feel like the Pillsbury Doughboy.” Craig shot me a look but didn’t say anything. A while later, Tommy said he had chores and had better head home. We watched him leave the park.

Craig said, “He never does chores.”

“Maybe his dad is reading him the riot act,” I said.

He snorted. “His dad doesn’t read; he might hit him with the riot act, all rolled up.”

Tommy had a rough family life, full of a bad-but-true cliché–drunken macho brawling between his father, his older brother, and Tommy.

Craig said, “Did you hear what he said about the Pillsbury Doughboy?” I nodded. Craig squinted. “That’s weird. I’ve been …” He stared into the distance. “Ever since that night at Intellia, I’ve been feeling weird. You?”

I sighed and nodded. “Only way I can put it is, I feel sort of soft and squishy.”

Craig nodded enthusiastically. “That’s it! I was thinking that I felt kind of …I don’t know…fragile, I guess, like walking on eggs, but, yeah! Soft and squishy; that’s exactly right! And weird dreams.”

“I got those, but not the last couple of nights.”

Craig gave me a look. “Something very weird went down that night.” I nodded. He said, “Something in our drinks, maybe?”

“Or the ice cubes, or the glasses, or the toilet paper, or the air …weird chemicals in the room …anything.”

He stared off into the distance for a long silent moment. “Well, unless we start having convulsions, or like …dying or something, we’ll just have to keep quiet and ride it out. We can’t tell anybody anything. Oh, and don’t say anything to Tommy. He’ll freak, probably think it’s some curse or something. You know how his folks go on about curses.”

Tommy’s parents were both devoutly Irish Catholic and also amazingly superstitious.

“Probably just got sick on dirty glasses or something,” I offered.

“In that place?” Craig snickered. “It was so sterile we could’ve eaten off the floor.”

May 24

Still soft and squishy, but now there’s a weird calmness. Everything is fine. I got a crummy grade on a test, one that I’d studied for, but I didn’t focus on the questions and did the thing wrong, pure and simple. Usually I would have blown up but now I thought, no, the teacher’s right. I need to pay more attention. I need to get along with him. I did ask if I could re-take it, or a different test. The teacher looked at me like he’d never seen me before and agreed to let me take a different period’s test. I aced that one. So maybe the calm thing is working out.

May 28

I don’t know if it’s a late spring fever, or what. I’m still calm, but hearing all the boys talking the usual talk is bugging me. It’s all ranking and trying to top the other guy. For the first time in my life, it seemed …silly. I was thinking about that while I walked to lunch and heard some girls talking. Jenny Allen, Miranda Stevenson and their buds. They were talking about Evermore, a new pop band and what they were going to wear to the concert and it sounded like fun.

I thought, the guys are just trying to outdo each other but the girls are joining in, sharing their hopes and will share the concert experience together. Guys wouldn’t even go to an Evermore concert because it wasn’t cool. And if they did go, all they’d talk about later was how great their seats were and how they could play the riffs faster in Guitar Player than the guitarist himself.

Never thought like this before. Maybe it’s growing up. Maybe that’s part of the calmness, just taking life and thinking about it.

June 1

Two more weeks of school left. I’m getting used to this odd feeling; I mean, it isn’t odd anymore. Craig and I were talking about it, figuring we were just ‘coming out of it’, whatever it was, when Tommy came up to us. He had a black eye and a swollen cheek, and told us his big brother told him that he’d been whining like a baby and just slugged him. We’d seen Tommy’s bruises when he was younger, but not for awhile.

“What’d you say to piss him off?” Craig asked.

“All I said was that we should maybe spend time as a family, talking about our day, instead of just eating and back to the TV.”

Craig and I looked at each other. I asked, “Why’d you say that? I mean, you’re right, but …why’d you say it?”

He shrugged. “I’d helped Ma with the dinner. First time I’d done that. Ever, I think. She just looked so tired and I thought of the four of us, you know, it’s a lot of work. So I asked if she needed help. I learned a lot of stuff, you know, about cooking. And then watching my dad and brother suck it down and thinking they’d just get up leaving their dishes and not even a thank you to Ma, and …” He shrugged again.

Craig and I locked eyes. We were both thinking the same thing. Tommy helped cook dinner? And then lectured his father and brother about their eating habits? He was lucky he got off with a black eye!

June 6

I had a long talk with Jenny Allen today. I realized we’ve been classmates since kindergarten, and when I heard her before Math telling Elaine Blackwood all about the Evermore concert, I thought, she’s a nice girl. Lainey is, too. And so on the way out of class I asked Jenny about the concert. She looked startled that it was me asking, but launched into another enthusiastic telling. I was right; it sounded like fun. Way more better than the guys standing at the locker room talking about a NASCAR crash.

Jenny smiled. She has pretty auburn hair. “I never thought you were into Evermore, Chris. I mean, I don’t know any boy that likes them.”

“I don’t really know them, I’ve got to tell you up front. It was just, well …hearing you tell Elaine about the concert made it sound like it was a really cool experience.”

“Oh, it was!” She lit up and went on telling me about it.

We separated at one of the hall junctions and I headed down my hall. Tommy was leaning against a locker, watching her go.

“Jenny was telling me about a concert she went to,” I explained.

He nodded. “Cute skirt,” he mumbled, then blushed.

That bothered me a lot, because it wasn’t something he’d say, and he knew it.

And he was right; Jenny’s skirt was cute.

June 7

I thought about it last night, lying in bed. And a weird dream came, based on the events of the day. I was sitting at a concert next to Jenny Allen, and we were screaming our heads off. Everybody was screaming. Over the screams and the band I could hear ‘cute skirt’. Then Jenny and I were holding hands and jumping up and down giggling and then separated and I ran home to call her and talk to her some more. It was all so warm and so friendly and so fun and so nice …

June 8

Craig had some bad news. Really bad. His dad has gotten transferred to the East Coast, and they hadn’t told Craig or his sister Teresa–she’s a senior in high school–until the end of the school year. But Craig’s sister is pretty smart and found out a week early. So the parents have already made their plans and school ends the 12th and Craig leaves the 14th and that’s it.

After all these years.

Bummer!

June 10

Tommy, Craig and I decided to spend a last day together. It’ll be the 13th, when we should be enjoying the first day of summer vacation but we’ll be saying goodbye. I don’t want them to know it but I cried last night, thinking about it. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I guess it’s the end of the school year, Craig moving away, it all just piled on and I hugged my pillow and bawled.

Mom came in and asked what was wrong. It was so nice with her sitting next to me on my bed, stroking my hair and saying, ‘there, there’. I felt really close to her and rolled up and hugged her, crying. Finally, I had to say something.

“Mom, I’m …sorry, I’m getting your blouse wet. It’s really pretty, too,” I said, brushing it.

“Thank you, honey.” There was an odd tone in her voice. “Don’t worry about the blouse. I know you’re crushed at Craig leaving.”

“You knew?”

“They told me last week, and said that they couldn’t keep it a secret from their kids any longer so you’d be finding out and they wanted me to be alerted to how sad you’d be. I know you’ve been friends for so long …”

I started blubbering again. She did the ‘there, there’, adding ‘hush’ every so often. Finally I got the crying under control. Oddly enough, I felt better.

“Mom, I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Maybe it’s the growing-up thing, but I feel all out of sorts and having weird thoughts.”

“Well, it’s all part of being a teenager. You just turned fourteen a little while ago so it’s all so new.”

“I don’t think it’s that. I think it’s …” How could I put it? “I think it might be something more. But I don’t want to tell you until …well, until a little while longer.”

“I understand. I remember this time, being your age,” she said, smiling. “Dimly, of course, because I’m so ancient!” she teased.

“You are not ancient!” I retorted. “You are just about the prettiest mom ever! I love that you’re so …well, so you.”

“Why, thank you, Chris, and I love you, too. Now try to be brave about Craig leaving.”

***

I don’t know what she thought about our little talk. Did she think I was a normal boy dealing with being fourteen? Did she think I was gay and losing Craig was breaking my heart? How could she ever guess that I thought that all three of us were being changed somehow by that night when we’d been doing something illegal?

End of Part 1