"Zzzzzzzz," buzzed my phone, making me sit up quickly in a panic and search around like a madwoman trying to find it. How dare somebody disturb my perfect sleep!
"Hello?" I yawned sleepily into the phone, not even bothering to check who it was.
"OH MY GOSH, ALLEAH! YOU'RE OKAY!!!!" Oliver's voice hollered into the phone. I flinched away harshly, yanking the phone away from my ear so I wouldn't go deaf and letting out a little yelp.
"Oliver!" I complained, putting my phone cautiously back up to my ear. "I really didn't want to go deaf at an early age!"
"Oh, sorry," he lightly chuckled, making me roll my eyes at him.
"It's also super early in the morning! And I'm kind of tired from the past few days, if you hadn't noticed," I stated.
"I knew it," he began to sound distressed. "He's raping you, isn't he? I knew this was going to happen! Alleah you have to tell me where you are so I can come rescue you! I could be like the town hero for my best friend!"
"What are you talking about, Ollie?" I asked in confusion.
"They kidnapped you, Alleah! Please tell me you remember! Please don't tell me they're giving you amnesia pills too!"
"Ollie, I'm not with a rapist," I told him as seriously as I could manage. "I'm with my father."
There was a long pause. "You don't have a father, Alleah. He's probably just saying that."
"And I have a twin brother," I continued, ignoring his last comment.
"What are you...do you even hear yourself, Alleah?" he stammered, completely and utterly shocked. "What has this man put through your head?"
"Oliver, you have to believe me. I am telling the truth," I promised, tapping my fingers on the frame of the bed in irritation.
"Do you have proof?" he asked. He was starting to sound more convinced, much to my ultimate thankfulness.
I was going to have to lie on this one just to get him to shut up. "DNA testing and everything, Ollie. And why would my father lie about me having a twin?"
"Well, um, I guess he wouldn't," he said, sounding slightly upset. "Where's your real mother?"
"She's...," I hesitated, frowning at my brother's side of the bedroom. "she's dead."
"She's dead?" he sounded surprised. "So she's the only one you haven't met because she's dead?"
"Well, it kinda depends on what you mean by meet."
"I mean like you've seen them face-to-face."
"Oh. Well if that's the case, then I've only met my father," I said.
"Then where's your twin brother?"
"That's kind of another story in itself, Oliver. Don't you have to be in school in like 20 minutes?"
"Yeah, but I just really had to hear the voice of my best friend, especially after yesterday when Jessica came to school saying all this junk about how you got kidnapped by these two men who had guns pointing at both she and you and who chased you down the block to knock you out and take you."
"I don't even think there was a gun pointing at her," I sighed. Of course she would use that to get attention.
"Why did they even take you? Why couldn't your dad have just come down here to get you himself? Why did you have to be taken away right then? I mean the least someone could've done is talked to your mom about it. She's been an emotional wreck ever since Jessica opened her big fat mouth and said that you'd been kidnapped."
"Tell Jessica that she needs to shut up and to call me sometime because she's causing more fuss than there needs to be," I groaned, running a hand through my hair. "The truth is that I would be kidnapped by a true bad guy by now if my father hadn't have been there to rescue me from the town. I would've been gone for good and you never would have seen me again. You can still see me at this point but only if he doesn't get me."
"Good heck, Alleah," Oliver muttered. "This is starting to sound like some kind of action story. Honestly, have you thought about getting a publisher?"
"Oh shut up, Oliver," I grumbled, scooting off the bed to go check out my wardrobe. Oliver definitely had me awake for the day.
"Just saying," he defended himself. I could only imagine he was raising his hands up in surrender like he always did when I told him to shut up.
"Yeah, whatever," I couldn't help but let out a small sigh. I heard him let out a small laugh on the other line, but didn't get a chance to bug him about it.
"So tell me, Alleah, why is some other man trying to capture you? And where is your twin brother?" he wondered. His curiosity was going to be the death of me.
"My twin brother, whose name is Andrew," I added, emphasizing on his name majorly, "is with the man who is trying to capture me. The reason the man is trying to capture me is because I have powers. My twin brother also has powers, and that, my friend, is the reason that my twin brother is with him, why my mother is dead, why I was in an adoption for the first sixteen years of my life, and why I am now with my father in an attempt to escape ever being in that man's custody and also to rescue my brother."
Another long pause. "Alleah," Oliver suddenly whined loudly. "My head hurts! How am I going to remember any of this? Honestly? This is almost as bad as reading Shakeapeare and the teacher expecting you to know everything. Except this time, I'm going to have to tell everyone about this!"
"Oh stop complaining, Molly. Just be glad this isn't you because I'm still in shock," I told him, pulling out some jeans from the drawers I had been searching through in the wardrobe closet.
"Well you should be! But seriously, what are you going to do about your life here? The volleyball team is counting on you, Alleah! You're their top sophomore player and they really need you in order to get past regional stuff and into the competitions. What are you going to do about that, hmm?"
"I don't really know," I admitted. What was there to do? My father would never allow it.
"And what about your poor adopted mom over here, hmm? The one with a broken heart and sadness overwhelming her-"
"Oliver, would you please just shut up? I'm doing the best I can under the circumstance I'm in, alright?"
"But seriously, what about your mom?"
"My dad needs me more right now, Ollie," I told him truthfully, even though I knew Momma Johnston was really hurting. "He's the one that needs me right now because he went sixteen years with none of his family around. The evil man killed my mother, the evil man stole my brother, and to keep me safe he put me up for adoption. He deserves to have some of his family back with him right now and to be honest, I need him too."
"Alright, well I guess it's up to you," he said softly. "Thats just my look on it."
"It's okay, Ollie. You didn't know. Thanks for being such a great friend and looking after me to make sure I'm safe. You have no idea how much I really appreciate it."
"Anytime. Thanks for telling me everything. Keep my best friend safe for me, okay?"
"I will definitely try," I promised him, picking up a yellow and white-striped tshirt from the drawer to go with the jeans I already had lying out on the floor. "I hope to see you soon. Keep texting me, alright?"
"Of course I will, best friend. I also want to keep hearing you, so I will probably call three to five times a week, depending on my schedule for football and homework and all that jazz."
"Well, unless you want to be late to 'all that jazz', you had better get going to school, mister!"
"Oh, crap!" he shrieked, which was followed by a bunch of running. "I'll talk to you as soon as possible, Alleah!"
"Okay, Ollie! Bye-bye now!"
"Bye, Alleah!" he yelled and it was followed by a "beep".
I quickly slipped in my tshirt and jeans, setting the phone on my nightstand. That had been a very nice talk and as grateful as I was that things were being sorted out at my old home, I couldn't help but miss all of my friends. What were they all doing?
"Good morning, kiddo!" my father's voice sounded from the other side of the door, practically scaring me half to death.
"Hey, Dad!" I called back, quickly putting the finishing touches on to my outfit. "What's up?"
"I was just coming to tell you that your breakfast is ready if you're hungry. What do you say?"
"I'm starving," I admitted, my stomach letting out a grumble at the thought of food. Throwing my phone in my back pocket, I ran to the door and opened it, running straight into my father in the process.
"Ooof!" came blowing out of my mouth as I hit my dad with full force, making me fall over backwards right on my butt.
"Good morning, Alleah," he chuckled, holding out a hand to help me up. Grasping it, I pushed off the floor to get back up and let out a small chuckle of my own.
"Sorry, Dad," I laughed. "It's been an interesting morning to say the least. I'm kind of out of it."
"Why's that?" he wondered as we began to walk toward the kitchen at a medium pace.
"My friend Oliver called because he was worried about me," I explained. "Apparently my adopted mother was freaking out and my friend Jessica opened her big fat mouth to the whole school and said I'd been kidnapped by some really bad men. And I told Oliver the story."
"That's a bummer," my father frowned. "I didn't mean to cause a ruckus. I just wanted my daughter back to know she was safe and happy."
"That's exactly what I told Oliver so hopefully he can get everyone calmed down as not to worry about me, if you know what I mean."
"Yeah, even though I'm sure some still won't believe him," he sighed. "Even you didn't for the first little while and I don't blame you. I wish I could've kept you and raised you myself, but the past is the past and we can't change anything. By the sides, it would have been far too dangerous."
"It's okay, Dad. In a way I'm grateful to you because I never would have met such wonderful people, but at the same time I wish you could have been the one to raise me."
"Me too, Alleah," he wrapped his arm around my shoulders and pulled me close to him in a tight hug. "Me too."
"But do I honestly have powers?"
"Yes you honestly do and today I'll teach you how to use them. It's not too hard. Zemlicka taught your brother how to do it."
"Have you seen Andrew since he was taken?" I asked him. I'd been curious about this one for a while, but before I'd been too afraid of his heartbreak that I didn't dare ask.
"Twice. Zemlicka visited my work two times, each time asking me to reveal where I was hiding you, but it did him no good. Why would I tell him where to find the rest of what I lived for? He already has taken two-thirds of it, one third never to be replaced. Andrew didn't even look at me. It smooshed me inside like a thousand pounds of bricks."
"Who does he look most like?"
"He looks just like you with emerald eyes, dark brunette hair, and a gorgeous smile that melted my heart. He's not small, but not big and his skin was as fair and beautiful as yours. You're definitely twins, now that I've seen you at a close distance. You both look so much like your mother, but you have my colors."
"That's pretty awesome," I admitted as we sat down at the dinner table with a large breakfast in front of us. There were eggs, golden toast, smothering bacon, glossy sausages, and even little creme pies surrounded by jelly and whipped topping. My stomach let out another loud growl.
"Here we have breakfast. This is what you're going to practice using your powers on, once we get them going. Its super simple, I promise."
"Um, okay," I smiled hesitantly. "Let's do this."
"Okay first I want you to open your hand up, no fisting up, and aim it at the tray of food you like the least."
"Easy," I said, aiming it straight for the toast. "I am not a fan of toast."
"Okay now think of a better food to replace it with. Once you do that, try to increase your energy flow toward your hand. Once you do that, release it toward the toast and it will turn into the food you desire."
Doing as he told, I followed his step-by-step instructions and the toast turned into a huge plate of gleaming red strawberries, making my stomach go wild.
"How did you know how to do that?" I gasped, shocked at what I just did.
"It's all in here," my father pointed to his head with a smile on his face. "And I once built a robot who did the same thing. You'll get to the point where you do it without even thinking."
"Awesome!" I giggled happily. "I thought that was going to take forever to learn!"
"Nope, it's simple stuff," my father grinned. "Now who is hungry?"
"Me!" I exclaimed, reaching for the strawberries. This was so freaking cool. Maybe I could save my brother after all. It certainly gave me a new hope.