Enjoy!
"Yes Auntie Z is pulling up now." I waved at her as she pulled up to the airport entrance.
"Tell her I said hello dear. Bye bye." She made kissing noises through the phone and I smiled. "Bye bye, Mother."
Auntie Z got out of the car to help me with my bags as I opened her trunk. Zyana, is her actual name, but I've called her Z forever. "Hello Athena dear, I suppose your Mother has already told you everything you need to know before you left?" Yup, I was told this ever since I could walk. On the first full moon when I turned sixteen I had to go to Auntie Z's and have her teach me the way of our family while also keeping a low profile.
Our family has done this even before they left Ireland in the early fifteen hundreds. My great-great-great-great-grandmother was part of the Salem Witch trials. Of course, her and the others had accused the non-gifted girls to keep themselves save, and when it was over they all moved across the other parts of the country. Ever since, we have had to be in hiding from anyone who wants to harm us.
"Yes Auntie, and she also said I had to help in your shop. Is that true?" She grabbed the biggest suit case as she closed the trunk and opened the back door setting it in there. "Yes, of course. I could use the help." She kissed my forehead and walked to the other side of the car. I shut the back door and opened the front door and sat down. "You might even be able to be the fortune teller when you get good enough with your powers. But until then you will just sell the stuff in the front of the store." The store in question was a shop for people looking to buy anything remotely magic. Magic not magick. She only ever uses her real powers for non-gifted when she's telling fortunes. Even then she holds back, not wanting to tell them something they don't need to hear.
As we got into the city I started to feel that's different form when I feel the essence of people and animals everywhere else. I feel that too, but this is something different, not animal, but not human either, like it's not of this world. "What is that? It doesn't feel like anything I've ever felt before." She sighed as she looked ahead."Ever since I've moved here, I've felt that. But not as strong as it's been since that stuff that happened when the army locked out everyone from New York. Since then I swear I see things that no human, nor gifted has ever seen. I hear things too. Some sound like they're not of this world. But I don't know."
She sighed and waved her hand. "But never mind that. While you're here you'll be going to Roosevelt High, and when you get back you'll help me in the shop until it closes at six. We'll have supper and then you will do your school work. After, you can do whatever you want. In doors at ten and in bed by eleven. If you have plans past that you need my permission to do so. Weekdays the shop closes at seven, but you'll only have to work until lunch, then you're free. Understand?" I nodded. It's a very organized schedule, but it's not bad. At home I couldn't go anywhere past seven and even then I had to tell my Mother where I was at all times. If I left someplace I had to text her, I had to tell her where I was heading and which route I was taking, and I wasn't aloud to leave until she texted back. It made for a very limited amount of friends.
"I think that'll be alright." I looked out the window and watched the scenery, or lack there of. It isn't like at home where there are trees as tall as skyscrapers and tiny houses. This was skyscrapers and little to no trees or bushes or grass for that matter. The closest thing to nature I can see are little homemade garden boxes and that's it. Never mind, there's a flower shop. But that's it.
"Is there, by any chance, a park around here? Because I don't think I can learn any spells on the sidewalk." She turned a corner and parked next to the sidewalk before turning the car off. "Yes, but it's two blocks past your school and even then you won't be doing your spells there, I have a special secret garden on the roof of our apartment. Of course, I have to pay extra every month but at least it gets natural sunlight and water instead of florescent light and filtered 'natural' water."
Above the shop there is a little area that was supposed to be used for employees, a kitchen, resting area, bathroom, and two little offices. She changed the offices into little rooms and the resting area into a living room. She has the one room and gave me the other. The only problem, there's no lock on the door. On the plus side there is a window seat. Although it's not a very pleasant view.
As I start putting clothes and my other things up Auntie Z is cooking beef stew with potatoes, carrots, and onions in a pot, some beans, macaroni and cheese, and corn bread. I can smell it from here and my mouth starts to water, of course I have to wait another fifteen minutes before I can eat.
I pick up a picture of me and the family. My little sister, hair as curly as Mother's, freckles just like her, and brown eyes like her as well. Her small chin taken after Daddy, and the rest taken from Mother. Even though I have curly hair and freckles. My eyes are violet like Daddy, dark brown instead of dirty blonde, and I'm a whole lit paler than my Mother and little sister too.
After dinner, I ask Auntie if it's ok to take a walk before heading to the shower. As I step out of the shower I wrap myself into a towel and wipe the fog off the mirror. My hair dripping on my shoulder in a tiny pattern: Drip, drip drip, drip, drip drip. As I stare at my face in the mirror, I swear I start to see something. I look closer and it looks like it's a green figure. Then, just as it appeared, it's gone.
Since my powers showed up a couple months ago stuff like this has happened. Sometimes it's something as simple as a pencil moving, other times it's big things like if I were to touch someone I would get their entire life in a jumble of pictures and sounds.
One day, when I handed my teacher my work from the day before his hand grazed mine and I got images of him and his wife arguing about how she needs surgery on her lungs and how they don't have the money. I heard him yell words I've never heard him use before, right before he stormed off and went to his shed. Before that I hadn't known he had a shed, or a wife that needed lung surgery, or that they were living pay check to pay check from his teaching job.
It's things like that, that makes it mandatory for ever gifted to learn how to use her powers. My Mother had to move to her grandmother to learn, my sister will have to move to Auntie Z's just like me. When I have girls they will have to go to Auntie Z. So on and so forth.
My Daddy wasn't told about this until Mother had me and she was forced to. Every woman in the family hopes and prays that they don't have girls. There are even some cases where the women killed the girls. Being gifted is hard enough, having one makes it harder to hide when they show powers. Mother says when a gifted is born she has strong uncontrollable power. It fades over time before reappearing once a girl is around her teens. I was lucky to get mine as late as I did. It's dangerous to have powers like this in a world that will kill a person for being different. If a gifted were to be caught they would be subjected to experiments, and all gifted would then be hunted down and killed.
Walking helps me keep calm, and gives me a chance to watch people as they go about their normal lives. Bliss to the things that live in their world with them. I see a squirrel run across a power line, and down the pole. It stops near an old homeless looking man and they have a stare down before the old man runs off screaming like a maniac.
As I turn the corner I have to press myself against the wall before a guy on a bike runs me over. "WATCH IT!" He screams at me like I was about to run over him! "I'm not the one not paying attention, Jerk!" All I see as he rides off is his hockey stick and baseball bat strapped to his back. I don't understand why people have to be like that. I stare at him getting angrier as he gets farther. Angrier and angrier until something makes his front wheel stop and he falls over the bike.
Oh crud! I run over to him as he gets up. "Oh my gosh. Are you alright? I didn't mean, are you alright?" I pick up his bike and look at him, Oh my gosh. I knocked his teeth out! "You, your teeth, did I, you knock your teeth out?!" He smiles and grabs his bike. "No, Those have been gone. I play hockey, and that's one price you have to pay when you play." I have a sigh of relief, at least I didn't injure him.
"I'm so " Wait I can't apologize. He doesn't think I had anything to do with it, unless I apologize about calling him a jerk. "I'm sorry I called you a jerk." He laughed. "Don't worry about it, I've been called worse. Names Casey." He held out his hand and I hesitate, I don't want to accidentally snoop in on his memories. I look at him and slowly take his hand. I grab his hand and wait a moment...Inside I sigh with relief. "Athena."
He shakes his head. "No I should have been paying attention. I'm sorry." He takes a step to his bike before wincing and grabbing his leg. "Are you ok? My Aunt has a first aid kit back at my place. I could " He raises his hand before he grabs his bike and uses it as a makeshift crutch. "Nah, my house is just a few houses down. My Mom has a first aid kit, me being a hockey player and all."
I can't just leave him to writhe in pain as he walks home. "At least let me walk home with you so you don't hurt yourself further. I don't want to be responsible if you break your leg and have no one to help." I catch up to him and he smiles again. Like twisting his ankle is nothing. Like he's been through hell and back which makes this a piece of cake. This guy is either full of himself or he has been through hell and back. My bet is on the first one. But then I don't know him, I don't have the right to judge.
"So, have you been in New York long?" Was it that obvious? I don't know how but he knows, maybe it's because he's been everywhere and hasn't ever seen me. "Just got here today. How'd you know?" He motions around us. "When someone gets kicked by karma not a whole bunch of people would be as helpful, much less make sure I make it home. They'd probably laugh and make a snarky comment before walking off." He laughed as we turn a corner. I helped because I was the one who made you wreck, is what I wanted to say but what I said was:
"Well, that's not really how I do things. I'd never forget if I didn't help." Corny yes, but what could I say? 'Oh I'm the one who made you sprain your ankle, I'm a witch and I got mad at you when you almost ran over me so my uncontrollable powers stopped you wheel and you flipped.' Yeah, when pigs fly.
He stopped and turned to an apartment. "Well, this is it. Thanks for making sure I didn't break my leg." We said our goodbyes and he went through the door. I turned to head home and I swear I saw a shadow as I left his apartment. But with how long it's been since I've had any kind of rest, I just shrug it off. I mean, who would be jumping from roof to roof? I certainly wouldn't.
"Alright Athena, try one more time. Which form of the God or Goddess would you use if you want to make this flower healthy again?" I was sitting in front of a wilting flower as I have been for the last twenty minutes. Each time I've tried this I've failed. Oh well, fourteenth time's the charm right? "The Celtic Goddess Brighid." She motioned to the flower and as I looked at her. 'Keep your focus on the flower.' Like she needed to tell me again. "Which candle will you use? Green, pink, blue, or red?" I picked up the blue candle and began to light it. "The blue one, for it is the color of health." I didn't dare look at her as if I did she would smack me on the head because I started the spell already. Once you start a spell you need to keep your focus on it and nothing else.
"Good, invite the Goddess by name and ask her to empower and help you with the spell." I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. "Brighid, Goddess of health, I invite you to this circle to empower and assist me tonight." I waited before opening my eyes as I felt Auntie Z pacing around me. "Now, recite the spell." I put my hands to the flower and focused all my energy into healing the wilting Orchid. "Magick mend and candle burn, Sickness end , good health return." I could feel my power, it was just like all the other times. My power is like a new animal that had spent all it's life on the streets, it won't listen to me and if I try to contain it for a purpose it fights back.
This time though, I could see the flower starting to stand back up, it's color returning, and it's petals growing back. But as soon as I got my hopes up the petals fell off and it went limp before doing dim. I put my hands down. "I'm never going to get this right am I?" Auntie Z looked at me sympathetically. She knelt down next to me and put her hand on my shoulder. "Of course you will, you've just got your power, it will take a while to gain control. You just need to practice."
"I'm glad you said that. Cause, here's the thing." She gave me a stern look. I've only ever gotten that same look from my Mother, I guess it runs in the family. "What?" I almost wish I hadn't said anything, but here goes. I took a deep breath. "When I was walking a boy almost ran over me on his bike and, well, " I took a deep breath. "I kind of stopped his wheel when I got mad at him. But it's not like I did it on purpose, my power is too feisty I can't control it just yet!" She pinched the brim of her nose and sighed. "He doesn't know that you did it does he?" I shook my head. "No, but I felt awful and helped make sure he got home."
"At least you didn't just walk off. Just, try to keep your power away from your emotions. Bad things could happen if not."
the lair
"What do you mean you just fell? That sort of thing doesn't just happen to someone who rides their bike everyday." April couldn't be more confused. I am too, but not that much. You fall, you fall. Like when you are trained for sixteen good years as a ninja but you are bested by someone now and then. Not me, I always beat all of 'em. But that's not the point.
The point is there's nothing suspicious going on. He just fell. "I just think you're trying to forget the fact that a girl was flirting with him." She pointed at me. When Casey walked in the lair with Leo he was limping. He just twisted his ankle but April wasn't buying it. She had both Donnie and Master Splinter check it.
"No Raph, I think that if he just flipped he wouldn't have twisted his ankle. I don't care if a girl was talking to him." Whatever. I think she's just jealous and she wants to make it up to him. Even then, every time I mentioned it both Donnie and April would get mad. Donnie didn't say anything, but the looks he gave me said as much.
"Even so, my bike wheel just stopped, and she wasn't flirting with me. She seems the type to not call people names that much, after calling me a jerk my falling made her feel guilty. So she was just concerned. You could tell she wasn't from around here. That's it." See, there ya go. But April wasn't convinced. It's like talking to a brick wall when she has her mind set on something, just ask all of us.
Leo put a hand on her shoulder. "I was there when she was walking off April, if she was up to something she would have changed the look on her face. She looked ashamed. I agree with Casey." She sighed and rubbed her hands through her hair. "Ok, alright. But if something like that happens again we're looking into it." I rolled my eyes. What else can be said to get it threw her head. But whatever, at least she's stopped talking about it.
"Now, can we please stop talking about Casey's twisted foot and continue with our day? We still have to go patrolling and I don't feel like sitting here any longer then I have too. I want to step on some foot." Leo rolled his eyes. He turned to me and motioned to Casey. "Someone has to take Casey home first." He turned to him. "Sorry but, you can't patrol tonight you're gonna have to rest at home."
Micky jumped up. "I'll do it!" We all looked at him. I'd like to know what goes through that head of his. "Um, ok. Casey, Micky will take you home. When you get him home call me and I'll tell you where we are." Micky put his hand up in salute before moving to Casey to help take him home. He's not going to call. Recently, when Micky gets a chance he goes off. Where at? I don't know. But I don't think he'll be with us any time soon. When he does leave he's gone for around an hour each time. But hey, what can you do.