Not long afterwards, everyone started to go home. It's a good thing too because the twins were starting to get restless and there was no way the girls would survive the terrible twins once they put their grumpy pants on. Once everyone was thanked and ushered out the door, the girls gathered a bunch of junk food and went down to the basement to get started on their annual movie marathon sleepover. A few years back, her parents had upgraded the basement into a theater room and sprung for a projector and big projection screen. Between that and the comfy sectional and ottoman that formed a bed, it was the perfect place for the movie extravaganza. Delilah had already gathered the blankets and pillows for them in preparation for the evening filmfest but had waited for Lia to pick out the lineup for the night.
They were now standing in the living room looking at the bookshelf that housed all the movies her parents had collected. They had quite the collection, so it took a bit to look through them all. They had picked out a few already and were looking for a final one. Delilah had picked out a sci-fi movie and much to Lia's dismay, a chick flick. Lia had of course chosen an action movie and a gory scary one. They were now trying to decide on a comedy to scare off the heebies from the scary one.
"How about this one?" Lia said.
"Ugh, you made me watch that one more than enough when we were kids. If I have to watch Michael Jordan play basketball with cartoons again, I may go a little looney myself! We gotta watch this one! This was so hilarious!"
"Um, as if! That is like so totally yesterday! I'm like for reals going to have to like, totally double pass on the bay area drama" Lia said with her best valley girl impression she could muster. "How about this hilarious classic? You never expect the fluffy bunny to be a vicious carnivore. Perfect movie choice, am I right?"
"..."
"Hello….Space cadet….Are you going to answer me?" She asked after a few moments with no response. When Lia still didn't get a response she turned to get Delilah's attention, but realized she wasn't even looking at the movies anymore. She was staring out the window into the back yard. There was an owl there, just outside the window. It was perched on the window sill, staring back at Delilah.
"What in the…." Lia said in shock stopping mid sentence as it started tapping its beak on the window. "What do we do?"
"Its standing on something. It looks like a letter" Delilah said while pointing at the owl's feet. "It looks harmless, I'm gonna open the window."
"Are you nuts? That thing can peck your eyes out! Or at the very least claw them out! Either way, I like my eyes right where they are!" Lia screeched, sounding much like an owl herself.
Delilah didn't respond but slowly started moving closer to the window. Lia snatched a blanket from the end of the couch and was holding it up like a net, just in case she was going to need it. Just before Delilah reached the window, she lunged for a fire poker as well. Better safe than eyeless.
Delilah was surprised the owl had not flown away yet. It had only moved to the deck railing to get out of the way so she could open the window. She very slowly and carefully started opening it. The owl immediately flew into the room and landed on the couch, letter in beak. Lia had screamed like she was going to die when it was in flight, but calmed down quickly when she realized it was not coming for her eyes.
Her parents came rushing in right after, on high alert due to Lia's scream. Seeing that no one was hurt her mother said "What in the world were you screaming for? You nearly gave us a hear…" She froze mid sentence when she finally laid eyes upon the owl. "What is that owl do...uh...no way...it looks like the ones from….no…wait...it can't be...can it…..I would have noticed...Have you…." she mumbled as she turned to her daughter, unable to finish any of her sentences. Delilah's father was just standing there with his jaw hanging open, a look of disbelief on his face.
"Is that from where I think it is from?" Her father had finally regained his senses and had turned to her mother to ask this.
The owl had not stopped looking expectantly at Delilah and she was trying to keep an eye on both it and her parents while she was trying to figure out what they were talking about. She realized the owl was trying to hand her the letter so she cautiously took it from its beak as it rubbed its head on her hand. She swore she saw it nod and wink at her before it flew back out the window and disappeared beyond the trees. She looked at the letter that was now in her hands. It was the back side of the letter she was seeing and there was a wax seal on it with a weird imprint, shaped kind of like a heart. She flipped it over and saw that it was addressed to her specifically, address and all, but no return address. She went to flip it over again to take another look at the seal but her mother snatched it out of her hands before she could flip it back over.
"What the…? Give that back! It was addressed to me!" Delilah yelled at her mom and she tried to reach for it, but her mom would not give it back.
"I need to speak with your father real quick" Her mother said quickly while walking out of the room without waiting for a response or even checking to make sure he was following her. Her dad just turned tail and ran. He chased after her mother while asking questions Delilah couldn't quite hear since they were already upstairs and out of hearing range. The sound of their bedroom door shutting broke the shock the girls had been frozen in.
"What was that all about?" Lia asked confusedly, still staring at the empty staircase as if an alien had decided to pose for selfies there.
"I have no idea, I have never seen my parents act that way before. That was so strange."
After about 30 minutes, Delilah got tired of waiting. She went up to her parents door and knocked. "Are you going to tell me what that was all about or not?"
Her mother opened the door only to say, "We will, but not while Lia is here. You go back to enjoying your night and we will talk to you tomorrow" and proceeded to shut the door in her face.
"Can I atleast have my letter?" She asked with no response. She knew that there was no point in arguing. Since her mother had made up her mind, she knew it wasn't going to change. She was so confused but knew when the battle was lost, so she gave up.
She went downstairs to relay to Lia what her mother had said. She could tell Lia was going to try and demand for answers. She had to do a bit of convincing to get her to understand that bugging them would not get them answers, just make her parents mad. She finally convinced Lia to go and try to watch the movies they had picked out, though neither of them could really pay attention. They had too much on their minds.
The wonderful thing about being in the basement was that the sun could not shine in and there was no sound to wake them, allowing them to sleep in. This was the main reason they had always stayed down there when they had sleepovers. It was more of a benefit this morning, since neither had slept too well the night before. They had been kept up all night with all the unanswered questions bouncing around their heads. So aside from Lia's snores, the sounds of Delilah tossing in her sleep, it was dark and quiet in the basement. Most of the night, Delilah had been having nightmares, but she had been dreaming about swimming with mermaids when her mother came down to wake them.
Delilah's mother must have decided they had slept in long enough because she bounded down the stairs with pan of warm, freshly baked cinnamon rolls in hand. If the sound hadn't done the trick, the smell definitely did. What was heard next was a mixture of grumbles, from not only the girls, but their stomachs as well. It smelled so good they had almost forgot that this was no typical morning after breakfast they had grown accustomed to.
Once they were finally sitting up, hair sticking up in every direction and dark circles under their eyes, the questions of last night came flooding back and they both groaned again. Before either could start asking questions, Delilah's mother went back upstairs, with the cinnamon rolls in hand of course. What time was it anyways?
The girls had no choice but to follow the delicious scent trail up the steps and into the bright light that flooded the house. Covering their eyes like they were vampires and were practically hissing like them too as they stumbled through the living room tripping over furniture. They finally made it to the kitchen and plopped down on the bar stools at the island, both looking rather grumpy.
'Food before questions' they both must have thought because they immediately began piling their plates full of food and shoveling it down like they hadn't eaten in weeks. Her mother had really outdone herself, there was quite the spread covering the entire island. Aside from the cinnamon rolls made from scratch, she had made muffins, eggs, bacon, sausage, hashbrowns, and had cut up a big bowl of fresh fruit. There was even a carafe for both orange juice and strawberry milk, both of the girls' favorites.
"You guys look like you partied hard. Are you sure you guys didn't do any drinking last night?" Delilah's mother asked with a chuckle, being the bright eyed, bushy tailed morning person that she was. She was obviously joking since what 11 year old would ever even drink alcohol?
"Hardy Har Har. Now are you going to tell me what last night was about? Or are we still going to pretend like nothing happened?" Delilah said with a very unlike her attitude.
"I already told you we could talk later" she responded pointedly so as not to say, 'not in front of Lia.'
Delilah sighed in frustration and continued to chow down on her breakfast. She then downed her OJ and then dragged Lia away from her breakfast to gather her things from downstairs. The basement was a disaster, there was food, blankets and pillows everywhere. Lia started cleaning up the mess but Delilah stopped her.
"The sooner you're outta here, the sooner I can get answers. You can come back tonight and help me clean up this mess. Hopefully by then I'll have something to tell you" she said while practically shoving Lia out the door.
It was time. The moment of truth. She plopped down on the armchair across from the couch where her parents were drinking coffee. She crossed her arms, frowning, and staring at each of them in turn, trying to figure out who would break the silence first. Both of them were seeming to talk to each other strictly through head nodding, eye movement, and facial expressions.
"Are either of you actually going to start this conversation or are you guys going to keep talking telepathically?" she asked frustratedly.
Finally and surprisingly, it was her father who spoke, "honey, have you ever noticed something strange happening that you had no explanation for?"
Delilah just stared at her parents with the look of utter confusion. "Huh?"
Her mother turned to her father and said, "Nolan, maybe we should just test her, it's possible it could be true. This would be better shown instead of explained. I don't think she would believe you anyways unless she saw it for herself. Why not just cut to the chase?"
Now Delilah was really confused. What were they talking about? At this point she noticed her letter was sitting on the table between them. It was still unopened. Next to it, there was a long and skinny box. It looked like one of those boxes expensive bracelets come in, except that it looked a bit beat up. Her father opened the box and pulled out a stick. He gave it a quick inspection, looking it over from all angles, swiping it through the air a few times, and giving it a slight bend. He then nodded giving it its approval.
Alright, she was completely lost now, "Can one of you please just explain what in the world is going on?"
"It's better if we just show you," her father responded quietly while walking out into the back yard. She looked to her mother expecting some sort of explanation but she only motioned for her to follow him. She had no choice but to get up and join her father out the back door.
It was cold outside since it was nearing the end of summer. The sun hadn't quite peeked out from behind the trees and clouds yet, a few birds were chirping in the distance. She really wished she had more on than just her pjs from last night, she didn't even have anything on her feet. The dew, still shining on the grass, wet her feet and the bottom of her pjs. She really regretted not putting on a sweater or at the very least some shoes and wished she could be curled up in her warm bed right about now. Her father was just standing in the yard, staring out into the forest. Once she was standing next to him, he handed her the stick. It was thin but sturdy, with a couple of bends in it, and the handle was intricately carved with vines that wrapped around it. It was about a foot long, and looked like it hadn't been handled much since the carvings still looked sharp.
"Well, what am I supposed to be doing with this thing?" she asked rudely looking at the stick like it was some alien foreign object. She turned around to see her mother was sort of hiding just inside the back door. She was peeking around the frame just enough to see what was happening. She could tell her mother was nervous and a bit scared but didn't understand why. What was she hiding in there for and why did she look so worried? It was only a stupid stick. What could be so scary about it?
"Give it a wave," her father instructed still looking beyond the trees with a look of concentration. He took a step back so he was just behind her on her left. Why were they acting this way? Had her parents literally lost their marbles? She looked at the stick, and thought, 'well it's been a weird enough morning as it is, I might as well try.'
She gave it a small wiggle and nothing happened.
"Come on, that's not going to do anything. Really give it a wave" her dad said still not looking in her direction. He now had a hint of a smile on his face, but his brows were still furrowed close together.
She sighed and did as he said, giving it a swipe using her whole arm, sweeping it left to right. The leaves all over her yard went flying into the forest, the branches on the trees bending back, a few cracks sounding from the branches, and all the birds took flight. After a quick moment, the branches snapped back into place. She could not believe what she had just seen. She immediately dropped the stick, turned to her parents, frozen in shock. Her mother gasped from the doorway and had a very uneasy look on her face.
Her father on the other hand, had the biggest smile she had ever seen. He swooped her up and spun her around. "I can't believe it! It's true!" her father exclaimed as he set her down. "Who would have thought?" She was so confused. Her father picked up the weird stick, turned to her mother, and said "Sarah, get the trunk, it's time."
