Seraphina's Awakening

Chapter Five: Prophecies

"Sera, I'm really sorry about last night. Never in a million years did I see our first date happening quite like that." His eyes barely meet hers when his hands slip out and clench at his sides. The silence between them thickens. Almost like a reflex, she reaches out to comfort him. Her fingers touch his bicep.

"Don't worry about it."

"No, I'm serious." His eyes meet hers, blue-green, and deep like the sea.

"Jack," Sera's voice breathlessly calls from somewhere in the room, but it didn't come out of her mouth. Jack doesn't appear to question where the voice came from, but his eyes search hers expectantly.

"Don't worry about it." Sera shrugs it off, trying to shake that chill again. Maybe the radio was right—there's a storm brewing. "Trouble seems to follow me wherever I go." That's the truth. Since she was little, Sera would drive her mother crazy. Walking around the mall, she would take in lost toddlers, and while playing in the street, stray animals would flock to her. It wasn't her fault they followed her. What was she supposed to do with them? There was also that time a hurricane blew through. Hurricanes in New York are rare, but it's not unheard of. Actually, the weather seems to be getting increasingly unpredictable.

Dark weather makes her uneasy as it is. The one memory that still haunts her is that time she spent during the hurricane. Young Sera got caught in this storm walking back from the bus stop. Her high school had a problem with closing unless there was a state of emergency. She still remembers how the winds whipped her hair around and stray garbage cans rolled past as the rain drenched her clothes. She made it to her street just as the storm peeked. A tree dropped in front of her, cutting her off halfway down the dead-end street. To this day, she can remember the way the Earth quaked under her feet and the crunch of glass when the tree slammed into her neighbor's Buick less than a foot away. The tree was huge, blocking her off from the safety of home. She turned to head back down the street to a neighbor's house when the second tree fell, missing her by inches. The air from the fall was fresh on her face as branches wound into her hair like snaky fingers. She curled up in the space between the two trees, trying to regain her composure. Sticks and branches scattered around her, trapping her legs between branches under the tree she rested, dry and silent until the storm passed. The branches cradled her close, almost protectively. It took twelve hours before they found her in the misty heat. The cops sawed the tree and pulled her out from between the branches. The town newspaper ran the headline: An Angelican Miracle: Girl Survives Outside During Hurricane. A miracle, that's what they called it. Seraphina Cross – the miracle child. No one could believe she had survived in the storm for as long as she did. Even with the proximity of the fallen trees, they said she was lucky she wasn't a pancake. Sera didn't feel lucky. She remembered the fear, the anxiety, and feeling fragile between the two trees. The time spent with no space to move, has made her a little self-conscious in enclosed spaces to this day. Goose bumps sprout along her arms whenever she remembers falling asleep to faint singing. She's not aware where it came from and wasn't even familiar with the song, but the melody still comes to her sometimes. When it does, it becomes stuck in her head until she can't help but hum it.

"You're not kidding," Jack mumbles. Her eyes blink toward him, standing across the counter. How long had she zoned out? "So, Sera, what can I get you today? I hear through the grapevine you had a bad date last night."

"Oh," she giggles, "I had a date like you wouldn't believe."

"That good, huh?"

"He wishes." The harsh sarcasm tumbles out before she can stop it.

"Ouch!" He pretends to stab his heart with an invisible knife. The laughter allows the awkwardness to dissipate between them, returning to their friendly, fun banter once again. "What can I do to help make this day better?"