Jordan came by three times that day, each time with a new note, yet I had only responded to the first one. Okay, we need to talk… So, I know you told me not to do anything stupid, but technically, I didn't do it. At least… Not on purpose. My mother and I were trying to set up the ceiling fan, since the old one didn't work, and it fell on me when I was on the ladder. At least, it should have fallen on me… I shut my eyes, and expected the worst, and probably a broken bone or something. I expected it to hit me, but it never did. When I opened my eyes, the ceiling fan was on the ground underneath the ladder, and I was still standing on the ladder, untouched. Do you have any idea what could've happened? Wait… That's what you meant, wasn't it? You knew I could do that! Sorry. Not the time for accusations. Saturday is tomorrow, but I need to know what happened, and why.
After I sent the note, I noticed that I couldn't remember anything from the incident, except for seeing the fan fall, and then seeing it on the ground. Aside from a weird sensation in my chest and hands, which subsided after a second or two, I felt normal. Or whatever I was before all of that. Morgan told me that I shouldn't think too much about what happened, and not to worry about it. She'd tell me what happened soon enough, but she can't text me about it. She didn't offer an explanation, but I figured it was best to let it be.
For the rest of the day, I tried to figure out exactly what had happened, to no avail. Of course, sleep did not come easy, which was to be expected. Saturday morning came, and I slept for… Actually, I didn't sleep at all. Practically all night, I just stared up at the ceiling. My room already had a ceiling fan in it, so I was trying to figure out if I had just imagined it.
"I couldn't have imagined it." I said as I was getting ready to meet Morgan. "She seemed as though she knew what I was talking about. Maybe I imagined that too?"
"Imagined what?" I tensed up as I heard Henry as he came up from behind me. "No, you don't imagine that! That's crazy!"
As I turned around, Henry was looking next to him, a perplexed expression on his face. "Hey, there's Jacob! Maybe he'll know what could have happened?" His last comment was more of an unsure question than a statement. "Timmy thinks he saw something one second, then it was gone, and it showed up after it was gone. Is that real, or did Timmy imagine it?"
"Who's Timmy? Is he…" I looked at the stuffed animal in his arms. "Is he your fox?" I knew the answer before I even finished my question. "Well, Timmy the fox," I began, trying to suppress a laugh, "you may be right. But that depends on what you saw." Just then, it occurred to me that he might've seen the fan falling, then suddenly appearing under the ladder. "What… What did he see?"
"Timmy says he saw you. You were working, and he said something fell, then it was gone. But now he says it's back." As I started to open my mouth to speak, he cut me off. "What's that, Timmy? You want to show Jacob what you saw yesterday?" He looked up at me with expectant eyes, as if trying to mentally convince me to go with him.
"Let's go then!" Satisfied, Henry took Timmy away from the living room, where the ceiling fan was, and I breathed a sigh of relief as he walked out to the backyard.
"See? That's it, ain't it, Timmy? I knew that was it! Look, Jacob!" Henry ran towards the batter's box I had reset yesterday. "You were outside, and something hit it. Stick wall collapsed, and a bird-thing landed in it. Was the birdie okay?! You ran towards the stick pile like the bird was your friend, and he was hurt. Jacob? Are… Are you okay? Did you fall asleep? Are you a horse-person or a giraffe-person? 'Cause I know they sleep standing up. Hellooo? Jacob!"
Henry kept talking, but I was only half focused, and half zoned out. I was more focused on what I'd ask Morgan in less than an hour. "Hmm? Oh, right. No, Jordan's okay."
Finally, I realized what he was talking about. After he went inside, I saw a familiar shadow in front of me. Jordan was back. But she wasn't the only one. Back towards the woods behind the house, a stronger, more obvious presence dwelled.
As I started towards the woods, my phone went off, and I noticed the time. "How long was I out here? It couldn't have been that long!" I silently looked out at the woods, and the presence vanished. "Maybe another time." I told myself, as I headed towards the open door. Jordan seemed to fly away when the presence left, so I figured she went back to Morgan. Five minutes later, I had started back towards the woods to get my baseball, but I didn't sense anything there.
Morgan was at her house waiting, and as soon as I got there, she looked at me as if I had messed up. Before I could even say hey, she immediately threw question upon question at me.
"Hey, slow down! No, I'm not sure what happened to me. Yes, I'm sure it happened… Whatever 'it' is. Why are you asking so many questions? Is this bad, or will it help me? Was it a good thing that this happened? No, I didn't get hurt. This has never happened to me before, but you seem to know more about it than I do. Then again, I know nothing about it, so if you knew anything about it, then you already know more than me. I…"
She cut me off before I could continue. "I asked so many questions because I'm worried, and you just happened to ask about this, and it happened to you right after I told you not to do anything stupid." As I started to interrupt her, she stopped mid-phrase, and whistled two short blasts.
"Why did you— Ouch!" I winced as Jordan flew above me and dropped something on my head. "You were saying something?" As I recovered from getting hit in the head, Morgan continued reprimanding me. "Besides, you can't say I asked too many questions. You asked just as many as I did, if not more."
Morgan just looked at me, as if she was thinking something over. "Are you okay, or is something wrong? You seem like you're trying to figure something out. Did I do something wrong?"
Expecting an answer, I waited for her to reply, but after what seemed like a minute had passed, Morgan quickly jolted upright, and seemed startled. "What's wro– "
"Look up!" As I looked up, something fell above me, just inches above my face, and dropping. Since the object was small, I intended to just swat it away, but in the shock, I only managed to bring my arm halfway up, and the object was gone in an instant. "What just… How…" Just like before, my hands felt like they were buzzing, and this time, I looked down at them.
"Why—Why are my hands like this?" Even though the buzzing had now subsided, my hands were mottled red and purple, which hadn't happened before. Had it? Thinking back to when the fan fell, I tried to remember if my hands were like they were now. After a second or two, I vaguely remembered seeing the discoloration.
"Clearly, you're starting to figure everything out. I mean, you may not know why or how that just happened, but it seems as though you've noticed some differences this time. Your hands, for example, are discolored. Did you notice that before, or is that new? Don't think too much of it. Soon, you'll know what's going on. Honestly, I don't fully understand it myself, but I also had Lilith and Carmen."
"Who?" I asked this, not because I didn't know who they were, but because I didn't hear her. "Wait, what almost hit me?"
Looking down, I saw the object laying a few inches in front of my feet. "Alright, how did I almost get hit by an orange, when there's no trees or fruit stands anywhere near where it fell from? This makes no…" I trailed off, as I saw Morgan holding another orange. "So, you just happen to have two oranges with you? Why, exactly?"
"You see…" she began. "Not exactly. I don't 'just happen' to have them with me. Yes, I have them, but it's not just that… Maybe it's best if I just show you."
Awestruck, I silently watched as Morgan reached her hands out, and a plant slowly began to grow right next to her. After a few seconds, a tree had grown from this plant, and cherry blossoms started to form and fall away.
"How…" I began to stutter and trip on my words. "How is this… What even is this? Wait, so you mean that the oranges…"
"Were caused by me." she finished. "This is how I know so much about it. By "it," I mean—"
"What's going on. Yeah, I think I got it." I responded as she rolled her eyes, a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.
"Do you?" she asked. "Do you really? If that's true, then do it again. Or do you not know how to?"
"Alright, fine. We both know I don't, but you know that's not what I meant. What I meant was… Hang on… So you can do that with living plants, but can you do that if the plant has been used to make something? Hypothetically speaking, of course."
As though she had no clue what I was actually referring to, she casually pointed at a wooden baseball bat, and I watched. Sure enough, her hand lifted, and branches started to stem from the bat.
"Yeah, like that. Do you think you could do that with something that was made years ago? Something like a couch?" Suddenly, her face turned red, as if she knew why I asked.
"That's why I couldn't move… You were controlling the cotton and the wood in the couch, weren't you? What, did you really think I was going anywhere once I saw you walk over and sit down next to me? Honestly, I never even thought about leaving. Especially since you were the one about to sit next to me."
Morgan's face was already red, but my last statement made sure she was going to be red for a while. "I… Okay, so maybe I thought that you might not want to talk to me, because you didn't know me. So what if I was nervous? What do you expect? My anxiety doesn't exactly help either. There was no way I would've been able to say something right away. Most of the time, I just hang back, and won't say anything until about the second or third time." she explained.
"Oh, so I'm an exception? Do you ever hang out with anyone else after only seeing them once, or just me?"
Completely avoiding the question, Morgan "suddenly happened" to remember her friends, Lilith and Carmen. Not wanting to interrupt, I waited for her to finish speaking before I started talking again.
"Woah, take it easy!" I began. "I was joking. I know that's not it. I know that's not why you asked me to hang out."
As the red faded from her face, and she regained her composure, Morgan started to reply, this time without any falter or uncertainty in her voice.
"Sorry that I haven't been able to help you as much as I should've been able to by now. I've been trying to think it through, but I honestly couldn't explain it as well as Carmen or Lilith could. Without them, I wouldn't have been able to explain any of this. Sure, I could've shown you some of what I can do, but I still wouldn't have been able to help you with what you can do, or even begin to tell you the first thing about what we're able to do. None of us know how we can do it, though."
Slowly, the realization that Jordan wasn't there came to me, and I immediately had questions for her.
"Okay, so what's the story on Jordan? Is she your pet or something, or did you just happen to train her? She seems as though she's drawn to you, like she can't leave you or something. But now she's gone."
Flashbacks of the presence in the woods instantly flooded my mind, with such an intensity that I almost fell backwards onto the grass. Seeing me stumble, Morgan barely had enough time to reach out and make a patch of grass behind me rise and bring me back up, like a trust fall with the earth, before I suddenly dropped.
"Hey, you okay? What just happened? One second, you're standing there, asking about Jordan, and the next, you randomly fall, as if something overwhelmed you. Wait… I think I remember that happening to me before I found Jordan, and Lilith and Carmen before they found theirs."
"Found their what?" I asked. "You mean like a pet?"
"Not exactly." she replied. "Basically, they're like pets, but more important than that. So technically, you're half right. None of us know where they're from, or how they found us. They just did. We all have one that makes the most sense to us, based on our… 'abilities,' I guess." she continued to explain. "You'll see what I mean."
Hearing what Morgan was saying didn't exactly explain anything, because I still had no idea who she was talking about. Then the realization hit me.
"Wait, there are more people that can do things like you— "
"We. Things like we can." she interrupted. "But yes, there are others. Lilith and Carmen can do different things, but they are stronger even than me. The thing is, you're the one that's just figuring all of this out, and so far, you're stronger than any of us were when we first started. You'll definitely be stronger than any one of us… Maybe even stronger than all three of us together."
This whole situation took me a minute to process, until I finally began to piece together everything she was saying.
"Okay, hold on. So the ceiling fan? The orange? Were those both typical, or is that way you keep saying I'm more capable?' Obviously, I have little to no idea how either of those things happened, but you still say I'm stronger than any of you. How can you tell? Please don't get annoyed by my incompetence."
Morgan looked at me, while trying, yet failing, to stifle a laugh. "What incompetence? You're much smarter than you give yourself credit for. Just… Follow me, and you'll see."
She took me around back, and I immediately realized why. "So…" I began. "is there any specific reason you have all of this?"
Staring ahead of me, I looked at the massive house in the clearing she had taken me to, made up entirely of trees, shrubs, bushes, flowers, and vines. All of it was intertwined and held together by dried mud so that you couldn't see inside, but you could still tell it was significant to her.
"Step inside, and you'll see." she told me, in a half-hearted, not-so-subtle, worried tone.
"Okay, so how do I get inside?" I asked. Without a moment's hesitation, Morgan began to part the bushes that were functioning as a door. "Oh. Well, I guess I should've expected that. Never really crossed my mind. Honestly, I automatically assumed there was another door, besides the bushes, or I'd have to do something, kind of like a test of my ability."
"Actually," she began, "that'd be a good idea." Before Morgan could fully get the opening in the bushes to close, I dove through, so I could get inside. Morgan barely had enough time to yell something foreign, although it sounded like a frantic "Stop!" Then everything plunged into darkness.