Illusion: Destiny Awaits (In Editing)

13 - Sabrina

"Hello, girls! Would you like some snacks?" Mrs. Brandon greets us.

"Hi!" I respond.

"Can we eat on the trampoline?" Christi asks hopefully. Mrs. Brandon sighs.

"Only if the snacks aren't messy," she concedes. We cheer and hurry into her kitchen.

"What should we have?" Christi questions thoughtfully. I shrug.

"I suppose we could have... snacks?" I grin. She rolls her eyes.

"Haha. No, I was thinking more along the lines of specific foods. Like chips or something!" She clarifies.

"But those are messy! They would get crumbs all over. Then we would have to jump so vigorously that they all flew off!" I exclaim.

"We would have to jump so high, that we can touch the clouds!" Christi adds, giggling.

"Christi! You could've rhymed it! You could've said; We would jump so high, that we could touch the sky!" I inform her.

"Ah well. Another time," she says.

"But what if there isn't another time?!" I pout.

"Fine. We would have to jump so high, that we could touch the sky! There. Happy?" she adds.

"Yes, quite. But now, the question of the day. What snacks should we take?" I ask, now serious. Or as serious as one can be, after having that conversation.

"Uhhh, how 'bout cheese?" Christi brainstorms.

"Ooo! Cheese...and granola bars? Oh! And dried fruit," I supply. She nods, and we search around through the kitchen for them.

"Is cheddar fine?" she asks, referring to the cheese.

"Yep! Where are your granola bars?" I say. She points to a cabinet to the left of me. Oh. I knew that!

Soon, we have gathered our fuel, and try to get to the trampoline without dropping everything.

"Ahhh!" Christi shouts, as Ash bolts from outside, and knocks her over.

"My cheese! Oh my precious cheese!" I gasp at the fallen deliciousness.

"Yep, I'm fine. Just peachy, thanks for asking!" Christi grumbles.

"Why must thou cheese fall! Cheese, you will be with me forever and—Ash, NO!" I wail, as Ash snarfs up the precious cheese.

Christi rolls her eyes.

"CHEESE! I will be with you in heart and spirit! You shall not die, for you will live in my memory!" I wail as the last bits are licked up.

"Okay Sabrina, enough of the mourning," Christi says, dragging me away from my lost cheese.

"Wait! We must have a funeral for it," I say. Christi rolls her eyes.

"Listen carefully Sabrina. It. Is. Just. Cheese. Cheese!" She articulates. I gasp.

"How dare you insult my cheese!"

She drags me away from the crime scene. I sigh. Poor, poor cheese. But as it would have wanted me to, I will not mourn for long. I shall celebrate its life!

"We must celebrate its life!" I announce to Christi.

"Sabrina. You are going crazy! One, we are not going to celebrate some stupid cheese's life; two, you do realize, that you were going to eat the cheese anyway right, and—" She starts. I stop in my tracks.

"Oh," I say, a bit dumbfounded that I haven't thought of that.

"And I don't even know why I'm telling you all this, because this darn cheese didn't have a single life in the first place! It's food Sabrina, food. You don't mourn it, you don't celebrate it, and you certainly don't befriend it! Now can we take our remaining snacks and go on the trampoline?" She asks, a bit impatient now.

"Fiiiiine," I surrender. I look to the spot where I last saw my precious cheese. I'm about to scream at Christi in poetic language all about my dairy treasure, but she gives me a look, silencing me before I even say a word.

We clumsily climb onto the stretchy net and settle ourselves down with our granola bars and dried fruit. Taking a bar, I stretch out and bounce a little, shaking everything else on it.

"So, what's up with Adelaide?" Christi asks, also taking a bar. I shrug, my mouth full.

"I dunno," I say after swallowing.

"Well, that's helpful," Christi states.

"Well, do you have any ideas?" I retort.

"No, not exactly" she admits. I nod. This situation is really confusing. Like, first of all, who knew Adelaide has a brother! And second, why is she being nice? And third, who took our necklaces? Did Adelaide? Maybe her mom did? No, that would be weird. Why would she want them anyway? No, I think it was Adelaide. But the question is, why?

"I think Adelaide took the necklaces, I mean, who else would?" I tell Christi.

"I agree, but what is her motivation? Gosh, we sound like detectives," she says. I laugh. "We kind of do! Hmm, maybe we should get some magnifying glasses or something! Or some trench coats! And some notebooks! Except, I have a zillion notebooks, but they all have something in them. Or I just reeeeally like getting notebooks. Or both. Either way!" I say.

"Yes, but as great as that sounds, we are getting off topic here. Back to Adelaide!" Christi announces.

"Yep! So, why did she do it do you think?" I ask thoughtfully.

"I dunno. Do you think she knows the importance of them? What do they mean?" Christi questions.

"Let's ask Lupo and Skifter!" I suggest.

"Great idea!" Christi says.

"Uhh, Soul Animals? We wanna talk to you," I say with uncertainty. No reply.

"Lupo? Skifter?" Christi calls softly. Again, silence. I gasp.

"Christi! What if we can't talk to them because we don't have the charms!" I say horrified.

"Oh no. No, no, no. But without them, we don't know basically anything! Without them we are lost!" Christi panics.

"Do you think Adelaide knows that? Or did she just want to get under our skin?" I ask, panicking too.

"Agh! I don't know! This is too much! We need to get those necklaces back," I state, trying to calm down.

"You're right. We just need to think logically! Uhhh..." Christi trails off, clearly at a loss of ideas.

"We need to make a plan for when we go to school. Do we know which locker is hers?" I say, desperately trying to get a grip on things.

"Well, actually, I do," Christi informs me.

"Really! How? Whatever, just, which one is it?" I ramble.

"It's number 157," she tells me.

"Great! Great, okay, so what do we do when we get to her locker?" I question, mostly thinking out loud.

"Well, we should try to come to school early, so we don't get busted," Christi starts brainstorming.

"And now we sound like criminals!" I announce.

"Yeah, but still. We need them back!" Christi protests.

"Okay, so we get to school early. Then what? We might be able to ask some of her friends some questions!" I suggest.

"Like an interrogation!" Christi says.

"Um, well, sure. We would need to get an inside person though. They will never trust us if we asked them ourselves," I point out.

"Good point. We can ask Lani!" Christi says. Just then the doorbell rings.

"Girls, can you get that? It's Easton's friend!" Mrs. Brandon calls from inside.

"Sure!" Christi says. We hop out and race to the door. "Wait, where's Easton?" Christi stops.

"Who cares! Open the door!" I say. She unlocks it, and opens the screen door. The person who stands before me, I recognize. Recognize too well. It's Kase.