Mystik Realm: Celestinia Academy

Three: Water Disasters and a Birthday Party

My head spins, and I struggle to find a comfortable spot on a hard bench outside the front of the school. I take a large gulp of water to help with my headache and distract me from other things by actually doing something and then wait for the headache to pass again. I try and get myself to think of something to distract me from the pain, and irrevocably it goes to Lynor. Is she thinking of me right now? What could possibly be keeping her away from me, her own daughter? And those secrets she mentioned… what are they? Why were they hidden from me? And why hadn’t I been told yet? Maybe that was what Mara was trying to tell me about this morning, she is my mum's sister so she would know right?

My fingers trace the charms on my wrist, one for each element- Air; the one that reminds me of wind, Earth; the tree, Electricity; the lightning bolt, Fire; the burning flames, when I trace my hand over the curves I feel heat rush through me, Ice is the snowflake and like fire I feel a cold tingle up my spine when I brush my fingers over it. The wave; which is water -sends a cooling, sensation of calm over me, It reminds me of my first and only trip to the beach. The wave part, not the calm part.

***

It was summer three years ago and Demina had convinced me to wear a bikini saying ‘The boys will drool when they see you’ and surprisingly they had, well sorta...

Boys looked up at me when I passed by them on the hot sandy beach; trying to weave my way through everyone to get to the cold water.

When I’d first stepped into the waves they’d been freezing and had seaweed floating around, and a couple of boys gazed in my direction. I had watched movies and read books but most of them had described the water as clean and pristine.

When I had finally gotten waist-deep a large wave had come crashing down on me, it swept me under and strong currents had caught me and tugged me out to sea. I could barely fight it and being only 13 I was barely able to breathe.

Soon I’d almost drowned. No one had noticed that I had disappeared, except one person who was one of the guys from earlier, he rescued me - he was 14, Demina had told me and she said his name was Drake, I’d woken to him giving me mouth to mouth resuscitation as embarrassing as hell. I have no idea how someone so young could swim well and know mouth to mouth properly. I had awkwardly croaked a thank you through my burning throat- I owed him my life and unbeknownst to him he had also stolen my first kiss.

***

The last of the memory slowly disappears, as well as the pain in my head, that’s when I feel a cold splash on the tip of my nose- great, now it's raining. I force a tight smile onto my face as I get up and trudge over to the car park I find a soaked Demina waiting for me, there’s no room under the shelter, the rest of the school had made it impossible to actually get into a sheltered area without being soaked.

"Finally. You. Take. Forever!" a very frustrated Demina says, "and now I'm cold. Thanks so much, I really appreciate your kind gesture Alya Meriana Goldain! Very kind indeed." I cringe at how loud she’s speaking.

"Sorry Dem I got this strange feeling in my stomach in chemistry today, I could see, hear and smell things I shouldn't have been able to." I can see her shivering violently in the cold weather, she's very sensitive to the cold and today is freezing. The weather reporters have got to be clueless as to why, they predicted a hot sunny day and they get hail and I mean hail, it was raining earlier but now? it’s hailing, it really is cold I can barely believe that it is, in fact, summer.

“Let's just go, the bus will be here in a few. If you tell me all about it, that is and if it is a reasonable excuse for me to catch a cold, in summer no doubt," she says as we step off the sidewalk and cross to the other side of the road.

After I tell Demina about my strange exploration with the five senses she stays silent, not looking at me. She instead looks out over a large house that we’re passing, with an expression that is hard to read. I think it means that she knows something that I am unaware of and is pondering whether or not to tell me.

"So Mr Sardos is twenty-four right?” she finally breaks the awkward silence that has fallen between us since my last words explaining my situation.

"Yeah, why?" I ask confusedly as we finally reach the bus stop shelter, we can’t take a school bus home because none of them go as close to Demina’s house as the one that goes through this bus station.

"You know... I have a cousin named Stacy whose 22?" Okay, this is weird. I thought what she had to tell me was actually to do with me.

"So... you think Mr Sardos is going out with you cousin Stacy..?" I say raising my eyebrows and glancing over at her on my left as we sit down in the shelter to wait for the bus.

"Yep," she says popping the P, I was expecting some big revelation and all I get to learn about is Demi's cousins' love life, hilarious... not.

"I also have a half brother called Dalus Vidore, he's only a year older than you," She says smiling brightly but her smile is fake, her eyes don’t crinkle the smile is slightly too wide compared to her usual natural smile, she's avoiding the subject. "You two would make a cute couple, I can see that pretty easily..." She raises her eyebrows suggestively and glances at me, I glare back at her and roll my eyes.

The bus arrives shortly after, we get on quickly, trying not to get any more soaked in the still pouring rain, there are only around two dozen other people on the bus so we find a space easily at the back. We sit on a blue patterned seat next to each other, I sit by the window and make a point not to look at Demi so she knows I’m annoyed at her, she sighs but doesn’t object to my choices.

The rain slowly subsides as I watch the outside world go past through the bus window, the droplets of rain slide down the glass in fascinating patterns leaving small water trails behind them, I watch as they start to dwindle as the bus speeds through the streets. Mud splashes over the windows every now and then as the driver runs over deep puddles in the road, it trickles muddy trails across the pane.

The bus slows to a stop but I don’t look up, instead, I watch a black crow cleaning its feathers, somehow it feels like it's looking at me, and not it's ink black feathers.

"You coming?" Demi asks from beside me, I shake myself from whatever weird trance I was in and stand up, heaving my bag onto my back, and turning to Demi as we sidle into the bus’s walkway.

I step down onto the pavement and look to where the crow was sitting before, it’s gone, the only movement is the branches and their leaves swaying in the slight breeze.

The only continuous sound that accompanies us as we walk down the street to Demina’s house are our footsteps, with the occasional rustle of leaves joining it. We don’t talk at all until we reach the outside of the house.

“Kaiden, Willow and Jack are here already, mum must have let them in,” Demina says looking at Kaidens car, he’s nineteen and already has his driving licence, I don’t know why we didn’t think to drive with them.

I nod stonily, still annoyed with Demi.

Demi knocks on the door, the sound practically shattering the air like glass in the silent street, a few moments later Demi’s mum opens the door, her silky blonde hair tied in a fancy knot at the back of her head, and a floury apron tied around her. Demina’s mum and dad aren’t often home, they’re usually off on a business trip but Demi told me that her mum’s staying til Sunday as she’s been feeling ill lately.

“Hey Gena, how are you going?” I say as we step into the large house. Demina’s house is quite posh, it has two storeys, and is made from painted white stone, out the front there is climbing ivy across the windows and a mowed grass lawn, there are large windows with white lace curtains covering them. Inside the walls are pale pink to baby blue and the furniture is all plush and expensive, it has an excessive amount of furniture, there are also fantasy-like paintings adorning the walls everywhere, mainly flying horses and other strange creatures, some are not so pretty.

I leave my bag by the door, hanging it on a silver hook while Demi runs up the white wood stairs to her room.

“I’ve been better, I’ll drive you home anyway after you spend some time with the others, they’re waiting in the living room for you,” she says glancing back at me as she heads into the kitchen where I assume she was originally. I can smell red velvet cupcakes from that general area, yummy, I walk forward towards the room where the other guests are waiting.

"Happy birthday Ally!" Kaiden, Willow and Jack shout to me as I walk into the large living room, I paint a smile on my face. For their sake, I'll act as normal as I can and when we get to my house tonight Demi has some HUGE explaining to do.

I smile and laugh happily with everyone else as we walk outside to the back of the house, where Demina's swimming pool and water fountain instantly make me feel colder -It's warmed up again since the rain and now the sun is glaring down at us cruelly, burning my pale skin in minutes.

Willow comes up to me smiling as she passes over a small box and says more quietly that she hopes I had a good day, I smile and thank her as I open up the box, there's no card but inside is a sweet gold heart-shaped locket with a picture of her, Kaiden and Jack laughing up at the camera.

I walk over to the guys and give them a hug. Jack squirms uncomfortably when I hug him but he slowly relaxes and gives me an awkward pat on the back saying gruffly that he thinks I look nice in my clothes today. Kaiden, on the other hand, Is completely relaxed when I hug him and returns the hug with a knowing smirk in Jack's direction, Jack evidently blushes and turns away.

Demi hands me a red velvet cupcake and goes to check on the Trio. I sit down on a decorative stone bench and start chewing on it absentmindedly, it tastes a lot stronger than usual.

"You know Jack has a major crush on you right?" Demi's voice penetrates my occupied mind a few minutes later, I sigh I knew peace wouldn’t last.

I take a deep breath and say, "What? I had no idea!" overly sarcastically, still expressing my anger towards her subtly, or not so subtly.

She just rolls her eyes and I get up to go to the bathroom and suddenly that same pleasant yet not pleasant feeling I had before cascades through me and I stumble and lean on a side the water fountain.

My senses are already in overdrive as sounds, smells, tastes and feelings envelope me, a small amount of pain flows through me but quickly dissipates. I splash my face with the fountain water as I panic trying to make my senses go back to normal- not again! The icy cold water gets all over my shirt but seems to help marginally, however, the second time I try to splash myself with the relieving... my hands hit solid, unmoving ice.

I stare in utter horror at the new ice fountain, knowing I have somehow created it, droplets of water frozen in time, mid-fall, I stumble backwards as shockwaves reverberate through me I can’t look away. I hear the others gasp loudly behind me and I can't look at them, what am I? Somehow I know that it was not some freak coincidence that the water turned to ice after I touched it, the sun is to hot for it to be a coincidence, I’m sure that if I stood on it the ice would be solid enough to actually hold me.

I stare at the sharp spires of ice poking down from the fountain, I groan as reality hits me like a truck going 100 kilometres per hour, I did this, this is not some crazy dream I can wake up from to find I haven’t even had my birthday, this is real, somehow I did this.

Demi breathes out unsteadily and says, “Alya, we need to get you home, now!” Her voice barely registers with me.

“Mum! Can you drive us back to Ally’s house now!” Demina shouts the urgency in her voice must alert Gena to the need to leave quickly as it takes seconds for her to arrive, or it could be hours, I’m not quite sure I’ve lost my sense of time, kinda ironic really as my senses were on overdrive before.

I blink at the darkness of the house compared to the outside brightness, my eyes refuse to focus as they drag me through the house. I close my eyes, then I’m outside again and all I can see is red, I hear the sound of a car and assume it’s Gena’s, a hand tightens around my wrist and drags me sideways toward the car's engine.

A car door opens and I stumble into the car my legs fighting against the movement valiantly, I collapse onto the back seat of the car and hands shove my limbs inside the car then click my seatbelt into place. The door slams and footsteps run to the other side of the car, the engines revs and I lurch back into the seat as we move down the street, I can feel the speed rush but all I do is sit frozen like the fountain.