Juan dropped out of school too. I saw him again once or twice, helping his parents at their vegetable stand. I always tried to avoid that place, and when I went there with my mom, I'd hide behind her or look at the stands on the other side and walk by really fast so he wouldn't see me. I was always afraid he'd come up to me or call my name or something like that, but he never did. I'm sure he saw me more than once, but he played dumb.
Jorge and I kept going to practice our magic after school. It was just the two of us now, but I was more comfortable that way 'cause there weren't any assholes like Juan telling us that "magic is bullshit." But, to be honest, it did annoy me a little when I saw that Jorge could actually cast the spells he practiced and I couldn't. I would practice and practice with the same old feather, but I could never get it to move, while Jorge would learn one spell, then another, and another. I watched him intently to see how he did it, but he would just open his hand, make that dumb face, and he would cast any spell he wanted.
I never complained or blamed him for nothing.
But it wasn't long before Jorge dropped out of school too. At first, I thought he was just sick and would come back eventually, but after several weeks, I accepted that I wasn't going to see him again either.
So I ended up practicing my magic all by myself. I did feel bad for Jorge, but at least I could take the magic book with me every day, 'cause we always took turns borrowing it. Also, during those days I tried to cheer myself up by saying that maybe I was having trouble with the spells 'cause I was always distracted by my friends, and now there was no one to distract me.
Days and weeks went by and I still couldn't move that fucking feather. I remember one day I stayed up practicing until nightfall. I was sitting right under a window 'cause that was the only place the light came in. I read and reread the page with the telekinesis spell, I did everything exactly as it was written, and that fucking feather just didn't move.
"Please, please, move," I begged, but nothing happened.
I kept trying, but nothing happened.
"Move, move, MOVE!"
But nothing happened.
I put my hands to my face and tried not to scream, not to break the feather in half, tear the book, break everything 'cause I just couldn't do that simple spell, and I tried and tried and tried and always failed.
At that moment I felt some tears running through my face.
"You being a crybaby again?" I punched my chest several times. "Don't cry. Don't cry."
And I kept hitting myself until I didn't want to cry anymore.
"But I say to that sonsa bitch: 'Listen, you motherfucker…'" suddenly I heard someone's voice inside the building. I stood up, put the magic book in my backpack, and left very slowly so no one would hear me.
I went downstairs, and the voice sounded closer and closer.
It was pitch black, so I crouched down in a corner and stayed there. The voice sounded closer and closer, but I still couldn't see anyone. Judging by the voice, it must have been a kid between 15 and 20 years old, and if someone like him was in an abandoned building so late at night bragging about how he'd beaten the crap out of some idiot, he was probably part of the clown gang, the one that ruled the town back then.
A light appeared in the distance and slowly drew closer. The voice also grew louder and louder. I stayed where I was and tried not to move so no one would see me. The light kept getting closer.
It wasn't long before the light passed by me and I saw two idiots painted like clowns in front of me. I crouched down as low as I could and even held my breath. They were moving a flashlight from side to side to get a better look at what was in front of them.
At one moment, they pointed the flashlight directly above me. I closed my eyes and curled up into a ball, hoping they'd mistake me for a rock or something.
"Let's go, fuckface," one said to the other, and they left.
I waited until I could hear that voice quite far away. I stood up and walked very slowly toward the front door. When I saw it, I ran out as fast as I could, but suddenly something grabbed my backpack and pulled me to the ground.
There were two other assholes with clown makeup in front of me.
"Look, dude," one said to the other. "This kid must be from another gang."
"What you doin' in there, you asshole?" the other one asked me, and I was so scared that I just shook my head. "What you have there?"
They both took my backpack, opened it, turned it upside down, and shook it so that everything inside fell out. School books and notebooks, pencils, crayons, and my magic book ended up on the floor.
"Nah, he's not from any gang," one said to the other. "But what's this crap?" He grabbed the magic book and started flipping through it.
"You, kid," said the other one. "Wanna be a clown?"
I was so afraid I didn't know what to say.
"We always need clowns," he continued. "Or what? You think you're better than us, you asshole?" he then kicked me in the face, and I just writhed in pain.
"Look how this damn thing's falling apart, dude," that piece of shit who had my magic book was shaking it hard, and since it was already very worn, the pages were falling off. "We should just throw it away."
I wanted to tell them to stop, but I just stood there like a fucking pussy watching the how the pages kept falling. On them I saw spreadsheets, illustrations, and exercises that I had already memorized.
"If they throw it away, I'll never learn magic," I thought, but I didn't say anything.
"Let me see," the other one said.
"You're stepping on the pages, asshole," said the one with the book.
"What pages?" The other guy pretended not to see them, but he stepped on them and even dragged his feet to break them.
"Don't break them," I whispered, but they heard me and approached me.
"What did you say, bro?" One of them bent down and pulled my shirt. "I didn't hear you," he said, putting his ear next to my face.
I saw the pages torn and shredded on the floor.
"I'll be a clown, but please don't break them," I said.
They both smirked.
"But we're not even doing anything to it," the one carrying the book said and grabbed only a single page of it. The rest of the book detached and fell to the ground. "It breaks on its own."
"Stop it," I said, and I felt tears running down my face.
The asshole carrying the book threw it to the ground, raised his hands, and looked at me as if to say, "I'm not doing anything to it." The book hit the ground, and several pages came loose.
"Don't drop it," the other one said, and went over to where the book was. He opened his hand to pretend he was gonna pick it up, but when he got very close to it, he ended up kicking it instead. Several pages fell out of the book, and one of them was the basic telekinesis spell. The page ended up on the floor along with all the others.
"Stop it!" I yelled at them.
One of them picked up the book, and it barely had any pages left. He left it open and came over to me.
"Here," he offered me the open book, but just as I was about to take it, that other fucking piece of shit hit it right in the middle, where all the pages are glued, and the book, even though it had a hard cover, broke in half.
They laughed, and I felt such anger, sadness, despair, hate that I could no longer restrain myself. I screamed and cried with all my might and, without thinking, I punched one of them so hard I knocked him to the ground, even though he was way bigger than me. The other one tried to hit me, but he was moving very slowly, like time almost froze or some shit like that, so I dodged him and hit him so fucking hard that I sent him flying a few feet away from me.
Everything was so easy. At that moment, I felt a power I'd never felt before, like I was dreaming or high. Those clowns were lying on the ground, with their mouths dripping blood, and my fist was stained with the blood of those assholes. I did that, I kicked their asses. And it had been so easy.
You remember when I told you that magic is fueled on emotions? Well, I learned that at that moment.
So I ran towards them faster than ever and started kicking them and yelling at them. They just covered their faces with their hands, and I kicked them in the stomach, in the back, and they just screamed in pain and bled everywhere.
The clowns I ran into inside the building came out there and saw me kicking the living shit out of their coworkers. I saw them and raised my fist, but those fucking pussies ran away.
I'd been so afraid of them before, and yet it was so easy to scare them away.
One of the guys I beat the shit out of was trying to stand up, so I sat on him and started punching him in the face over and over again.
He just covered his head with his hands and yelled.
And I kept punching.
My hands soon were covered in blood.
And I kept punching.
And I kept punching.