| Chapter One
Normality Twisted
A fire ball files past my left cheek, “Hey, I’m the fire starter, not you!” I call out to my opponent.
“I just want you to have a taste of your own medicine,” he calls back from several feet away.
“Well, you’re going to have to do way better than that sir,” I laugh, dancing a fire ball of my own between my finger tips.
Fireballs and taunting, it is just your normal day on another planet in another galaxy. Of course it wasn’t always like this. Ten years ago, give or take a few, I was back home on the lovely planet known as Earth. I was going to middle school and trying to figure out the simpler things in life, like beating a final boss in a video game. Nowadays I’m physically beating the final boss, along side a few friends that I picked up along the way. Even back then I knew that I didn’t want to be your typical chick: yapping away on the phone at home and trying to find the date for the town fair. I can remember a time when I would lie in bed, wishing I could be far away and grown up. I guess every teenager gets those thoughts now and then.
It seems so long ago, like a distant memory that I can’t grasp my fingers on. What seems normal and real to everyone else, does not apply here. I just have to laugh a little at myself and to everything that has happened thus far. Sometimes I think I’m going to wake up and it’ll be all over.
My name is Anya, 24 years old and I can cast fire spells, among other things, and this is just part of my story...
Yawning, I arch my back, right before turning over, covering my head with the blanket. It's early in the morning and three days before spring break, waking up is something that I am not looking forward to.
I can hear my alarm clock going off again, a commercial for some product. I hit the snooze button again; this would be my third time.
I close my eyes again. It feels like a lifetime since I had any sleep, when in reality, I had a good six hours in dreamland. I can hear my dad in the kitchen and it'll only be a few minutes before he's knocking on my door to wake me up. Might as well make the most of it and sleep in as long as I can.
Five minutes later and there's a knock at my door, right on schedule. I roll over for the twelfth time, and this time around, I get a claw to the face. One of my several cats decided to sleep on the top of my pillow.
"You'll miss the bus," I can hear my dad from the other side of the door.
Throwing the blankets off, I reach down and find a pair of jeans. After putting them on in a sleep-like state, I plop right back into bed.
Yes, this is an ongoing event. I am not, nor will ever be, a morning person. A thought enters my mind, should I have locked the door? Especially now since I can hear it opening, screaming, "I'm up, I'm up!" just before my dad has the chance to use a water gun on me.
"Are you okay?" he asks.
"Why--oh," touching the scratch on my upper cheek, "apparently the cat tried to wake me up too." The scratch begins to sting a bit.
After getting fully dressed, I grab my backpack and head towards the bus stop. Funny thing is I have to pass another buss stop before I get to mine. A normal person would rather walk a shorter distance, but not in this case. All of the kids, who ride that bus, are from the same trailer park as I, and all of them are a bunch of rowdy kids. I'd rather walk father and ride a bus that would be mistaken for the juvenile bus heading towards the correction facility.
Ten minutes later, I am at the bus stop. Most of the people that ride this bus are already here, it’s a small group, and I get along with pretty much all of them. I really don't hang out with them while in school, but we tend to hang out afterwards and sometimes on the weekends. I really keep to myself at school, usually listening to my tape player or working on an essay for class. I'm not the best student in the middle school, but when it comes to writing essays and taking notes, I'm pretty good.
I throw my headphones on and sit on the edge of the sidewalk while waiting for the bus. Before long, I'm at school and walking past the cafeteria filled with students, as I turn the corner to hang out at the same area I normally do, a can of soda passes me by, inches from my nose.
Before I can say anything, I can hear laughing, followed by concern voices. It seems that one of the girls that ride my bus has thrown a can of soda at one of the guys who lives near the school.
Shaking my head, I lean against the wall, watching the scene.
"Hey, you okay?" Heather asks, the girl who had thrown the soda can.
"Yea, it didn't hit me."
"No, I mean that scratch on your face; I noticed it at the bus stop."
"Oh, that, heh, its nothing, my cat was sleeping on my pillow and I turned over, and well, you can guess what happened after that," I tell her, feeling a bit awkward. "So what happened here?"
"He said something about my sister, so I threw a soda can at his head, shame he's okay though," she laughs.
"Huh-huh......" is all I really could say; besides the bell rang anyway. This really doesn’t mean anything since everyone waits for the second bell to head to their class.
By the way, I'm Jennifer, your normal fourteen year old living in a small town in a larger city and I am in the eighth grade. Nothing really special to report, I enjoy video games and the beach, normal stuff, you know.
I'm in my first period class, gym, yea, a great class to have early in the morning, before we head to the gym or the track, we meet in a normal classroom (also used for health class during the first part of the year) to take roll and to figure out what we're doing for forty minutes.
"Alright class," the tall and very skinny female coach says, holding a clip board and standing next to a young male, who is half her height. "I know it’s past the middle of the year, but we have a new student."
Murmurs are heard throughout the class room.
"Kyle Roberts comes to us from another school. Treat him with respect and make him feel welcomed to our school. Please sit anywhere, Kyle; we'll be leaving here shortly.
Following the new student with my eyes, I get this strange feeling that I've met him somewhere before. The teacher said that he came from another school, but maybe he lives in the area.
"Today we'll be in the gym, basketball and volleyball will be available for play. Head to the lockers and then head to the gym, I will be taking roll call there, so if anyone wants to skip, detention will be given out."
The class walks out towards the gym, the usual groups form up and I notice that the new kid is alone walking in the back. Being shy myself and unable to just talk to someone out of the blue, I continue to walk on.
"Just go talk to him," my friend Teresa says, once we make it into the locker room.
"Huh, what are you talking about?" I stammer.
"I saw you looking at him in class," she nudges me.
"I just thought I knew him, that’s all," I say, walking into the ladies' locker room.
"Well, you won't know until you talk to him, right?"
"Umm, I'm sure I don't know him, so it doesn't matter anyway."
"How old are you now? And still without a boyfriend?" Teresa teases.
"So? Your point is?"
"I swear you can't be serious?"
"Whatever." I finish dressing in my gym shorts and shirt and head towards the gym.
Sure, she had a point, but so what. Not more than a year ago I had a taste of the relationship scene and that ended in drama, something that I could do without for a long time. Funny thing is, Teresa was part of that mess, or at least was the one feeding my information about my cheating ex-boyfriend. To this day I'm not sure if her intentions were good or not, and quiet honesty, I'm not even sure why I'm still friends with her. The thing is, one of my weaknesses is letting people off the hook after doing something bad, I tend to forgive way to easily and perhaps a bit too soon. To my defense, it’s always good to keep your enemies in range rather than away from your sight.
Waving her hand in front of my face, "Hey, are you just going to stand there all period?"
Rubbing my eye, I can see that Teresa is doing her usual, walking over to the guys to talk all hour. I normally play basketball with a friend of mine from sixth grade, but sadly Jeff was out sick. Looking around the gym, most people are just talking, sitting on the wooden floor, while a few are playing basketball. As long as we go to class and pass the final, gym at this school has to be the easiest class to pass.
The new kid is off by himself, a usual site when someone new comes to this school, shooting a basketball into the net. Rather than just standing around mindless for the remainder of the class, I decide to do something out of my comfort zone and walk over.
"Hey there," I say, great first impression, huh?
"Hi."
Small talk at its finest.
"So are you new to the area?" I ask.
"Yes and no. I tend to move around a lot," a pause. "Hey, didn't we go to the same elementary school together?"
"Ummm..."
"It wouldn't have been for long, I was only down here for two years, kindergarten and first grade."
"Sorry, I don't--" I try to remember as my ears grow hot from being embarrassed. Did we really go to school together before?
Laughing, Kyle brushes a piece of brown hair that fell in front of his eyes, "Don't worry about it, it was years ago anyway. I sort of have a good memory."
"Ah, I see." I say, unable to think of what to say next.
"Wanna play?"
"Huh?" I snap out of my daze.
"Basketball, unless, oh, you don't know how?" he teases.
I blink a few times, taken aback at what Kyle just said. "Excuse me?"
Laughing, he throws me the basketball and we play until the end of the period.
Its finally spring break and I get to baby-sit. Normally it would be a death sentence for anyone else, but I know the kid, so it wasn't a big deal for me. I was in charge of watching seven year old Miles Winder for the day. His mother worked as a nurse at the local medical facility and when school is in session, her son is at school, but during those breaks that all kids crave, Ms Winder tends to call on me, to watch her son.
"Alright, so what do you want to do today, Miles?" I ask him.
"Watch TV!!" he exclaims.
"You sure," I grab the remote from the coffee table, "it’s a nice day outside, you know, and I think my bike needs a wash."
"No!" he cries out. "I'm on vacation!!"
"Calm down, I'm only kidding, let’s see what's on."
The sky begins to darken as the day draws on. Miles has been watching TV and eating snacks for most of the time, as I listen in on the TV programs while messing around on my portable gaming system. Its not that I'm not into the cartoons that he's watching, it’s just that I've seen them several times over. The phone rings, as a thunder roars several miles away, we both look at each before I finally answer on the fifth ring. He laughs and continues to watch the television.
"Hello?"
"Jennifer, its Tenisha, I'm going to be a little late coming home, one of the temps called in and its been a little hectic here. I can pay you extra and there's food in the refrigerator."
"Don't worry about it, I really don't mind and my parents know that I'm safe here," I tell her.
"Oh thank you, I'll make this up to you later, I'll see you later."
I hang up the phone and head to the sofa, plopping down I pick up my game and say, "Mom's going to be late, so think of what you want to eat."
"Pizza!!!" he says immediately.
"Do you know if you have any?"
"Nope, we don't."
"Well, that doesn't help, right? We need to eat here, its going to rain soon."
"If we take the bus, we should be able to get to the mall before it rains. It’s still pretty far," he says, looking over at me with his bright blue eyes.
"And how do you know that?"
"The thunder, its still a good fourteen miles away."
"Huh-uh" That little show off. "But do you know the speed it’s moving and in which direction?"
He picks up the remote and switches to the weather channel, "And that’s why we have this great technology at our fingertips."
We listen in to the male reporter, "....for today it will be 30% of rain, with temperatures in the high eighties; we do have a system moving in from the west..."
"See!! Its still over the swamps, we'll be fine!"
"But how can it be 30% chance of rain when there's a storm right on the radar!" Shaking my head, "I just don't get it."
I feel Miles pulling on my arm as I stare at the TV, "Come on! We have to hurry!"
“Well, that took us over an hour to get over here, but,” taking a bite of my extra cheese pizza, “this is well worth it.”
Laughing between bites, “See, I told you it was a good idea!”
“Oh my god, did you hear!”
“This can’t be happening.”
Miles and I both look around the food court and we begin to see people walking quickly and talking very loudly.
I shrug, “Think it could be a tornado from the storm?” Shivering, “Because I really hate those things you know.”
“I don’t hear anything,” Miles answers back. “If it was a tornado, I think we would hear something, at least that’s what I read, something like a train-like noise.”
“They said monsters? Right? Monsters?
People begin to run, pushing others that get in their way, some head to the music store, since it displays TVs in the front.
“They say it’s the end of the world!”
“Hurricane maybe?” I say, a bit dryly.
“In April? And,” he shakes his head. “I can’t begin to say what’s wrong with that.”
Then we hear a frantic woman’s voice, “We’re all going to die!”
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