Sorry that it's been OVER A YEAR! I'm working on this story once more!
Read and Review (:
"It's just my luck to get a cold." Mason said over the phone, his voice nasally from congestion.
"The doctor called it a flu, Mase." I laughed, sifting some flour while on my phone. Max had left for 'There', meaning heaven I suppose, about three days ago. Life for me had pretty much gone back to normal, except for the random house guest that liked to pop his snowy head in every few days.
"Yeah, yeah. Whatever." Mase grumbled, before loudly blowing his nose. Chuckling, I stretched, popping a few cricks in my spine, before getting up off my bed and heading down to the kitchen to make Mace something to make him feel better. Maybe soup or something easy on the stomach.
"Good morning."
I froze on the bottom step and internally groaned. Was it so hard to ask for one day alone? Half-listening to Mace's stuffy-sounding rant, I stumbled into my kitchen. Frosty was there, lounged across my kitchen table just like the girl in Manet's painting Olympia.
I nodded my head in a silent greeting at the winter spirit, holding my phone against my ear and shoulder as I went to my fridge and started rooting inside for ingredients.
"Are you gonna make me something?" Mace complained, his throat sounding raw. "Can it be chocolaty? And peanut butter-y?"
"You are such a hormonal chick when you're sick." I laughed, pulling out cocoa powder. I guess something easy on the stomach wasn't going to happen.
"Awh, that's not a nice way to talk to your friends." Jack laughed, tapping his staff on the floor. Spindles of ice danced along the wooden floor, not enough to make it slippery, but enough to make me freeze my feet. Yelping, I hopped up onto the counter and glared at the white haired snow-pixie.
"Woah, woah, woah! C'mon, Cold Toes, don't be a jerk!" I yelped, tucking my red feet underneath my legs. Jack burst out laughing, his pale blue lips stretched into a massive grin.
"Cold Toes? Who's Cold Toes?" Mase asked, sounding slightly delirious.
"Uh...a cat. A stray, a filthy stray cat." I scoffed, shooting Frosty a dirty look. Frost stuck his tongue out at me before he began rummaging around in my fridge.
"But…you hate cats." Mase sniffed, coughing violently.
"Would you like your desire for chocolaty and peanut buttery in a cake, brownie, cupcake, or cookie form?" I tried to change the subject quickly. I really didn't want to have to explain to my friend that Jack Frost won't get the hell out of my house. I was starting to get tired of this routine that Jack has going on. Whenever he was here, he'd bother the hell out of me. As soon as he'd leave, I'd stumble onto some kind of prank he'd set for me. It started off small, like him freezing my milk. Then it began to escalate to him freezing the bathroom door knob shut while I was inside, and leaving ice on the floor for me to slip on.
"What, the cat?! You're gonna turn the cat into a cake?!" Mase yelped, which caused another coughing fit.
"No, your chocolate-peanut butter sweets, numb-skull." I laughed, opening a jar of creamy peanut butter and stirring it with a butter knife. A strange tapping made me turn my attention to Frosty, who was tapping my kitchen wall with his stick.
"Cupcake, please." Mase murmured, a large yawn coming over the line.
"Get some sleep, Mase, I'll bring these over later." I hurriedly hung up on my fellow-fire fighter.
"Can you knock that off?" I sighed, watching Frosty spin his crook around in his hands like a flag twirler. Frosty snorted, rolling his cyan eyes.
"You're no fun." Jack groaned, flopping down lazily in one of my kitchen table chairs.
"Oh, and who made you the authority on fun?" I rolled my eyes, beginning to measure out ingredients for Mase's peanut butter chocolate cupcakes.
"The moon." Jack said, as if it was common knowledge.
"The moon?" I echoed, turning my attention back to Frosty, who was tapping his fingers on the table.
"Well…actually it was the Man in the Moon. He's the one who chooses spirits to become Guardians, who are the spirits who protect children. We call him Mim." Jack said, picking at the dirt underneath his nails.
"So, is he one of those all seeing, all knowing beings?" I asked, taking a seat across from him while I started stirring all my ingredients in a bowl.
"Yep. He doesn't like to tell any of us anything he sees. Unless it's when he wants to." Frosty seemed a little bitter about this Mim character.
"That's how most celestial beings work." I shrugged, rolling my eyes. Biting the inside of my lip, I found myself watching Frost, who was looking around the kitchen. A strange silence covered the room, leaving me feeling a little awkward. I quickly stood and returned to my counter, preparing to pour measured amounts of batter into the cupcake pans.
"So, you live here by yourself?" Jack asked, looking around the sparse kitchen. The yellow and blue theme was sometimes painfully bright, but it wasn't so bad in the muted early morning light and the usual gloominess of my hometown.
"Yeah. My cousin lives next door, so I'm not completely alone. Where's your house?" I asked, taking a seat back at the table after putting the cupcakes in the oven. Unsure of what to do with my hands, I nervously started twisting and tying my hair up into a ponytail.
"I'm kinda a wanderer. Lots of places to see, not many places I like to stay in for too long." Jack answered his pale nose twitching like he smelled something strange.
"Except for my house, apparently." I laughed, cracking my neck. Jack snorted, rolling his cyan eyes and resting his chin in his palm.
"Hey, a visit or two a week is the least I could do after I almost killed you." Jack laughed, but I could tell he was still feeling guilty. He wouldn't meet my gaze, his orbs following the grains and swirls in my light-wood kitchen table.
"Don't worry about it, mate." I shrugged, my feet tapping the floor worriedly.
"What're you, Australian?" Jack snorted, a wicked look stretching across his face.
"It's Southern actually, and the whole 'almost killing you' crap, forget about it. Accidents happen." I shrugged. I've started to realize that Jack is one of those people who usually internalize their feelings. I could tell him that the car crash was just an accident a million times, but some piece inside of him will always blame himself.
"I'm a Guardian though! I'm supposed to be responsible." Jack scolded himself, his brows furrowing. His shoulders hunched in annoyance at himself, his cheeks puffing momentarily as he pushed out a puff of cold air.
"No offence, but you don't seem like the responsible type." I said bluntly, shrugging my shoulders as Jack shot me a slightly offended look.
"What!? You're telling me that I, Jack Frost, the blizzard wizard, is irresponsible?!" Jack scoffed, crossing his arms over his chest. A few strands of his pearly hair fell across his eyes, hiding most of his dark expression from me.
"Never refer to yourself as the 'blizzard wizard' again. If you do, I might slap you." I managed to choke through peals of laughter. Jack huffed for a moment before he too started laughing. Rolling his eyes at me, Jack smiled.
Jack
Visiting Era every so often wasn't as bad as Jack originally thought. Sure, his normal schedule was a little thrown off, but when had he ever really went along with his schedule anyways? Since when did he even have a schedule, other than the seasons?
Whenever he visited with Era, he was always happier when he left than when he arrived. Jack would get all the food he wanted, Era had a pull out bed that he could sleep on, and she lived where it snowed nine out of the twelve months.
Plus she gave the best reactions to his pranks.
Era would never scream, but she would let out a small yelp, and then hop away from whatever scared her. Her face would turn pale for a moment, before becoming bright pink. Just imagining the blush on her face made Jack laugh, which of course, someone noticed.
"What's so funny, Jackie?" Tooth asked, her wings fluttering behind her. Tooth had invited all the Guardians over for lunch, even though it seemed to be more of a tea party in Jack's eyes. The motherly Tooth Fairy smiled at Jack, her magenta eyes blinking softy, waiting for Jack to answer.
"Uh…just something a friend said." Jack muttered awkwardly. He hadn't told the other Guardians about how he recklessly almost killed someone. It had only been a few years after the whole Pitch incident, and Jack was still working on his credibility as a Guardian.
"You mean 'da girl you been seeing." North's statement wasn't a question. Somehow the massive Russian knew exactly where Jack had been going for the past few weeks. Jack felt his cheeks flush a bright red, which looked especially bright against his white face.
"Ya mean Snowflake's been meetin' a little Sheila?" Bunnymund scoffed, a teasing glint in his eye. Jack glared at his fellow Guardian and conjured up a snowball in his hand; a silent threat that he would throw it at the rabbit's head if he didn't watch his furry mouth.
"Ohhh, Bunny! She no little! She eighteen!" North said happily, crossing his arms over his large, barrel chest.
"She's nineteen." Jack corrected automatically, internally cursing himself when the chorus of 'ahhs' and 'ohhs' came from his family. Groaning, his cheeks flushed red again, pushed his plate away and pressed his head against the table.
"What's her name, North?" Tooth asked, practically bouncing in her seat. Jack could hear Sandy's silverware clinking as the smallest Guardian kept eating, seemingly uninterested in the conversation. Sandy winked at Jack, causing the winter spirit to shift uncomfortably in his seat. Sandy had known, too?
"She goes by Era Bailey, but her real name is Nordica Bailey." North answered, sending Tooth into her thoughts. Did she remember Era? Or her baby teeth? Jack turned to North, his brow furrowed.
"Nordica? How the hell does she get Era from that?" Jack asked North, confused. He'd never heard her real name before; everyone called her Era. Even the letters in her mailbox had been addressed to 'Era Bailey'.
...Not that Jack checked her mail or anything.
Her mail pile had been in his line of vision once while he was at the kitchen table, that's all.
"Her middle name is Erasma. She good girl. Many tattoos, very tough! Strange family life, but never in much trouble." North said, reaching across the table to pat Jack's back. "I'm happy you two are doing the friend-making."
"I remember her oldest sister, Ashleigh. Bad teeth! Poor thing had to get few of her teeth pulled. Nordica's teeth weren't great, but they were much better than her sisters! Hers were less crooked, and whiter, but it was a fight to get that little girl to floss!" Tooth said after a few moments of thought, tapping her fingers against her chin.
"Cute kids. Really good at findin' my googies." Bunnymund said, pouring himself another cup of tea. Jack turned to see if Sandy had found anything to say, but the dream Guardian was silent, watching the other's reaction before tapping his fork against his glass. The rest of the Guardians fell silent, patiently waiting for the older spirit to communicate.
Holding out his hands, golden sand images started to glow above his head. Two large stick figures, clearly a man and a woman, and then six other smaller images, two boys and four girls. Names lit up underneath the child figures, pointing out that Era was the fourth child born in her large family.
"I couldn't imagine having all those siblings." Jack muttered, looking at the sand images of Era's family. When he had been alive, families were usually very large, but he had only one sister. He couldn't image having to look after all those younger siblings.
Sandy frowned, shaking his head before closing his golden eyes. Suddenly, the eldest female sibling, suddenly seemed to throw a fit. The sand figure started to fume, throwing its arms around violently. The eldest sister accidentally hit the smallest sister, sending her crumbling to the ground in a heap.
The sand parental figures jumped to their youngest child's aid, while all the other siblings huddled together in fear. The eldest sister seemed upset, trying to apologize to the youngest, but the little girl jerked away in fear. The sand family swept away, making way for a new scene. Slowly, the sand painted the scenario of the parents repetitively reprimanding the eldest daughter, and the other siblings rushing away from the eldest sister in fear.
Jack was about to ask what the whole story meant, when the next few images made his blood run cold. The sand figure of the eldest sister seemed to turn into something…subhuman. What was once a beautiful girl turned into something terrible.
Then, a small gun materialized in the eldest daughter's hands.
Horrified, Jack watched as the eldest daughter aimed and fired, shooting the youngest sibling first. The smallest figure seemed to ripple before turning into a pile of glimmering sand. The family seemed to all arch in pain, horror, and fear. The father figure covered his wife and children with his body, but he too was blown away into a pile of glimmering sand.
Four shots in all.
Father, mother, youngest sister, and eldest brother, were shot, each crumbling into piles of dream sand. The sand images of Era, the eldest sister, the second eldest brother, and the second youngest sister were the only family members that stood standing.
The eldest sister seemed to see what she had done, dropped her weapon, and ran away.
"W-what...Sandy." Jack was appalled, too horrified for more words. In his 300 years, he's seen violence, but he never thought of his Era coming from a violent family life. Jack wouldn't know what to do if his sister was ripped away by any other living being, let alone another of his siblings. North let out a nervous cough, thanking one of Tooth's mini-fairies as she offered him more tea to break the awkward silence.
"Era…she lost much. She is very tough, very blunt. She also has this...ability to see. See us, spirits." North said, stroking his beard in thought.
"The Sheila lives alone. Next door to 'er cousin, but still alone in that house." Bunnymund said, pulling out an egg and paintbrush seemingly out of nowhere. "Her brother lives a few blocks away, and her survivin' younger lives with her brother."
"What about the eldest sister?" Jack whispered, almost fearing the answer.
"She's in prison, Jack." Tooth whispered, pursing her lips. Jack took in a deep breath, scratching his head. A part of Jack was upset that this happened, that the seemingly stone cold woman was really a wounded victim. Another part of him was angry. How could her sister, her elder sister do this!? She was supposed to protect her, but she did the exact opposite.
Another part of him was embarrassed. Should he be hearing her backstory from a third party? Of course not, but as soon as Tooth released him from his little tea party, he would be at Era's window in a heartbeat.
Lastly, and most likely the strangest part of him, was proud. Jack was damned proud of Era. She was just as strong as she held herself to be. Era was able to hold her head high, able to crack a joke, and able to love and let love other people. Jack wanted to fly her around the world, screaming in pride that Era, this girl, was the strongest being that he'd ever encountered in his life.
"Go, see her. Tell her we say hello." North chuckled, seeing Jack nervously fidgeting in his seat. Tooth giggled, her eyes glazing over in amusement and thought. Quickly bidding his family goodbye and grabbing his crook, Jack zoomed out of Tooth's palace.