Barren Cove by Ariel S. Winter Page A

area—but he would settle for a modern electric to start. It would take long enough to get a common model to Barren Cove, and he needed something to distract himself lest his bitterness over Beachstone require a more drastic outlet than the small pranks he visited on the boy—waking him repeatedly in the middle of the night, locking him out of all the bathrooms, shoving, tripping, pinching at every opportunity. Watching the boy flinch at his approach was fun, but he wanted to draw blood again. It was only the risk of his father’s ire that held him back.
    And then there was Mary.
    Mary, who no longer seemed to know he existed. Who preferred to play with her pet human, to fawn over him; the way she debased herself before him. To abandon her only brother! He revved the engine of his bike. He’d seen the two of them playing in the sand in the afternoons. It was another beautiful day. Perhaps he’d join them.
    He released the kickstand and took off, pushing the bike to the limit. The speed only fed his rage; the memory of Mary on top of him in the cabana, holding him down. He wanted to kill the boy.
    He reached the spot where the cliff was low enough that he could attempt a jump to the beach. The sand was horrible for the bike, he knew, but he didn’t care; it would give him a challenge when he next did maintenance. He flew off the edge, the flat ocean stretching before him like an endless road, and then the bike skidded in the sand, spun, and Kent found himself on the ground, one leg pinned beneath the machine. Without pause, he righted the bike and forced it down the beach toward the water, until the rattle of the sand crunching against the motor fell away, and he was on the hard-packed beach at the water’s edge, the waves spraying to either side of the bike like walls of water.
    He zoomed his vision and could make out the speck of Beachstone in the distance. He seemed to be alone. Kent grinned. A wave skittered up, the water splashing beneath his tires, and Kent was curious to see how his brake pads would work.
    As he approached Beachstone, Kent saw that the boy was reading from a tablet resting on his crossed legs. He didn’t look up, even when he must have been able to hear the buzz of the motor. When he was only feet away, Kent executed a spinning stop, spraying Beachstone with sand. The boy cringed, raising his hands in front of his face as though to ward off a blow.
    Kent jumped off the bike, letting it fall to the ground, the engine still running, and he grabbed Beachstone’s tablet before the boy had a chance to block him. He looked at the screen. “Ah, superheroes,” he said. “You humans did like to dream you could be better than you really are.” He threw the tablet into the ocean like it was a Frisbee, the dark, spinning rectangle traveling a good sixty or seventy yards before falling into the water.
    He circled the seated boy, whose nose and lips trembled in rage, even as he drew in his shoulders in order to make himself small. Kent smirked. He saw the little mounds of sand that spread out covering almost ten square feet, holes at various points; he guessed they were meant to be buildings. He kicked the one closest to him, the sand spraying over the others.
    â€œHey,” Beachstone said, starting to get up, but Kent turned on the boy, and Beachstone sat back down, ducking.
    â€œWhere’s your servant?” Kent said. “You need me to get anything? Somehow, you lost your tablet.”
    â€œShe’s not my servant; she’s my sidek—” He bit his lip.
    â€œYour sidek . . . ? Your sidekick. I see. And you must be a superhero, then.” Kent faked as though he were going to strike the boy, and Beachstone flinched. Kent grinned. This was fun. Maybe he could see why Mary would want to spend time with the bastard. He bent down so he was close to Beachstone’s face. “Do you feel super now?”
    Beachstone gritted his