This story is dedicated to my friends and family. Averox and manirox, I love you guys!
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Chapter 1
"Hey Olivia Check this out!" my brother, Matt, calls. I take a bite out of my waffle and turn to look at him. His finger points right at an unmade bag of popcorn. It puffs up and pops away.
"Matt! Can you please keep it under control? Just for one morning?" my mom asks, lightly stepping into the room, like a ballerina, effortless. She leaves again. I sigh.
My mother is perfect. She was born perfect. The first time our family went ice-skating, I stumbled, tripped, fell on my bottom, but my mother glided gracefully, as if she'd been practicing ice-skating for the past ten years. So there we were, my dad, Matt, and my sister, Georgia, stumbling in every way, crashing into each other, while my mom swiftly skated, doing tricks every now and then. But my mom had a rare power.
Unheard of.
She could make others perfect. But if she did that to someone who had just discovered their power, or someone who were still developing theirs, their power would completely stop developing, along with their body. Scary, really. It also took days, sometimes even weeks, for it to work.
"You're late," a voice says, inside my head.
"I know," I reply in my head.
I smile at her from across the table.
Georgia. Georgia was something else, you would think she was a normal eighteen year old, but she has the ability to read your thoughts, and communicate to you. So if Georgia read Matt's mind, if she wanted to, she could have a private conversation in her head with him. It was an ability I envied. She was made perfect by my mom. Georgia discovered her powers when she was sixteen, and convinced mom to change her some months later.
To be truthful, I never knew what to think of it. She's stuck as a 16 year old forever. Although to be fair, she's always looked older. I never knew what to think of mom changing her. She wouldn't get to watch Georgia get older. Wouldn't she want that? I suppose she justified it because Georgia can't ever get hurt now.
Georgia is the oldest. Matt is turning seventeen in a couple months. I am fifteen, turning sixteen in a week.
A week.
My palms sweat just thinking about it. My heart pounds harder. Sixteen. At sixteen, everyone in my family got their powers. I probably will too.
Suddenly, my mom races into the room at an inhuman speed, carrying a large laundry basket with ease and hands me my lunch, and becomes a blur again, yelling "bye" over her shoulder. I toss it into my backpack and hurry out of the house.
It's a warm May day, practically cloudless. A light breeze caresses my face as I walk.
I start sprinting, glancing at my watch. I reach Sharon's doorstep and press my finger on the cool surface of the bell button. Eventually the door opens and her mom greets me with a warm smile. "Sharon will be down in a minute," she informs me. "You can wait inside if you like."
"Thanks," I say jogging in, closing the door behind me. A sweet, tempting smell fills the air as I put my bag down. It seems to be coming from the kitchen. Mrs. Greene waves me over.
"I just baked some cookies, if you want some," she grins, her pearly white teeth gleaming.
"Alright," I say, walking over to the kitchen. I stand in the doorway.
"Come here," she insists. "I won't bite."
I couldn't help smiling. Mrs. Greene always seemed so nice. She has always treated me like a Queen. Well, she treated everyone like royalty.
She pushes the tray forward on the counter. I choose a cookie and bite into it. It's warm and chewy. "This is really good!" I declare, reaching for a second one. I hear light footsteps.
"Mom? Is Olivia here?" a gentle voice floats from the living room.
"You should go," she says, shooing me out of the kitchen.
"Hi Liv," Sharon says with a childish grin. She pulls on her backpack and hands me mine.
"Thanks," I say grabbing her arm, pulling her towards the door. "We're going to be late if we don't run," I say.
"I have a better idea..." she says, a mischievous smile spreading across her face. Uhoh, I think. Dropping her bag, she sprints to the back of her house, to her shed. She returns with two bikes. One is her mom's. Without any explaining, she practically heaves her mom's bike into my hands, yanks her bag on, and easily pedals away. I can tell she's laughing.
Just because I'm small doesn't mean I'm not fast.
Pedaling furiously, my coffee colored hair whips all around me. I catch up to her In about thirty seconds.
"Yoohoo...," I giggle. I turn back to see her expression. She's shocked, her bright cat-like eyes wide. I laugh harder, and continue speeding.
We reach school in four minutes. It is 8:30, which means we've made it just in time. The usual crowd of teenagers and a few younger kids is gathered by the front steps. A fire hazard but they don't really care. I move through the crowd along with Sharon after we park our bikes. No one gives way as usual.
The day is a blur. Nothing really happens as usual. I just briefly remember wanting to strangle my math teacher from the amount of homework he decided to assign.
The sweet sound of the going home bell rings and I rush out of school. I cram my jacket into my bag and dodge eager students filing out of the school building, searching for Sharon. I spot a thin, slender girl with black hair. "There you are! What took you so long?" I ask.
She doesn't reply, and leads me to the bikes. I grab the handlebars and am about to wheel it, when I hear someone calling my name. I scan the growing group of excited students. I don't see anyone who might be calling me so I shrug and continue to zig zag my way out of the school's parking lot. I hear someone call my name, and then Sharon's.
Who is that?
"Sharon? Do you hear that? Someone is calling our names," I say, scanning the crowd again.
Still no sign.
"I'm sure it's no one," she says quickly. She starts moving faster, shoving her way out.
"Wait! Stop! What's the hurry?" I question. Once we're out of the swarm of kids, she turns around to face me.
"Nothing," she says innocently, but I can see something in her cold eyes... hatred. What did I do? I sigh "I have to go now," she says softly.
"No! Wait!" I grab her wrist. "What's going on?"
A figure in my peripheral is hurtling towards us. I let go of Sharon's wrist and turn. Claire!
" Hey! What happened?" I question, smiling at her.
"I was calling you from back there," she points, breathlessly, back near the school entrance.
Claire. A close friend of mine, Her family and my family are close but not as close as Sharon's. Claire and her family have powers, just like us.
"Oh. It was you!" I laugh. Sharon mutters something darkly. I frown. "Uh so guys... want to come over?" I ask. I know nobody's home. My parents were out somewhere, my brother was at a friend's house, and my sister was out running errands. I don't want to stay home alone.
I'm too nervous.
"I don't mind," Claire replies. A dark look flashes Sharon's face briefly.
"Not thanks, I have a... a paper to work on. Catch you later," Sharon declares, in an annoyed tone. She turns to me. "Hey, return the bike, yeah?" She hops on the bike with ease and starts to leave the parking lot.
"Bye," Claire and I chorus. We're silent for a moment as we watch her pedal away, down the street. She turns the corner and is no longer visible. I chew my lower lip.
Something's wrong. Something has always been wrong. The two never could get along for as long as I could remember, and I never understood why. Claire genuinely didn't seem to understand, and Sharon on the other hand... was complex.
"Anyways, do you want to sit in the back?" I ask.
"Well... if you don't mind..." Claire responds sheepishly.
She's petite, so she probably doesn't weigh much.
"Course I don't," I say cheerfully. "Get on!"
She carefully climbs on. I start pedaling slowly, and after about thirty seconds, we are flying. I slow down as we get to Sharon's house. I wheel the bicycle to the back of the house and leave it leaning against the shed.
As we walk, she talks about some cute guy in her class. I'm not really listening, because I can't help but feel queasy.
A day that will change my life is approaching. It could be any day now.
We approach my house and I fumble with the keys for a second. Claire suddenly goes quiet. I sneak a peek and see her staring hard at a small dandelion growing inbetween the tiles. What is she doing? Actually, what is mom doing? What, with her being perfectly OCD I would have assumed she'd have set fire to the little plant now.
I manage to get the door open and stumble in. Dropping my bag by the stairs, I plop down on the couch. She does the same next to me. We drop into an uncomfortable silence.
"Have you gotten your powers yet?" Claire abruptly asks.
My palms start to get clammy.
"No..." I reply.
"Well..."
"Did you...?"
"Yes!" she says proudly.
"But when.... a-and how?" I stammer, sitting up straight.
"It all happened a week ago," she explains, combing through her dark brown hair with her fingers. "I was walking Coco, and he was sniffing around and then suddenly, out of nowhere, I hear a cracking noise and I look up and there it is. A large tree branch."
I try to ask her something but she holds up her hand, silencing me.
"The branch from a tree above us was breaking fast, about to fall on me. It dangled down from the massive tree and I just stared at it. I didn't know what to do. It was going to kill me. There was this noise of wood splintering, and the branch started moving up instead of down and it molded itself back into the tree... As if nothing had ever happened," she finishes, looking at my face to see my reaction.
I sit there, stunned. My thoughts are a jumble. She seems to notice my confusion. "Should I show you?" she asks. I nod. She leaps off the the couch and bounds across the living room. She flings open the door to my backyard.
Claire kicks off her sandals and stands barefoot on the freshly cut grass. She closes her eyes and stands there for a moment, as if savoring the feeling. I wonder if she's going insane. She opens her eyes.
"Where to start, where to start?" she murmurs. Then she turns to the apple tree that peeks over the fence from our neighbor's backyard, and takes slow strides. She walks to it so she's right in front of it. She's an arm's length from it.
"Watch carefully," she instructs. I nod slowly. Claire focuses on something. I inch closer.
What is she looking at?
I creep closer, not wanting to disturb her. I stand beside her. Then I realize her eyes are focused on a rotten apple suspended from one of the branches.
What is she doing?
Nothing seems to be happening. A worm peeks its head out from a hole in the apple. I cringe. And then I notice the color of the apple improving, it is becoming more and more red, and the worm crawling on it crawls right off. The marks on it fade away. I gasp. Claire reaches her hand out and the tree branch reaches forward. I'm in awe. She plucks the apple off and hands it to me.
"Eat it," she orders.
"O-ok," I stammer. I raise the apple closer to my face and take a good look at it. It looked so unreal. I bite into it. It's juicy, and sweet, and I can already tell it's the best apple I've ever eaten. I try stopping for a moment but I continue to eat, I can't help myself.
"It's so delicious!" I declare, finishing it off. I glance at Claire. She is still concentrating at the same spot on the tree. Slowly but surely, another apple starts to take its place. It grows and grows till it is equally red and big as the other one.
I start to understand.
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Hi people! This is the first story I have ever posted! Hope you enjoy it and tell me what you think in the comments! More soon.
Sincerely,
me