Matilda dreamed that night, strange dreams that morphed inside her, the kind she would only remember scraps of when she awoke. An image:

Shauna swinging by herself on a swing that hung from a lone tree on a lonesome bluff. She looked out into the sea, a yearning on her face and singing:

"My Bonnie lies over the ocean.
My Bonnie lies over the sea.
My Bonnie lies over the mountains.
Won't my Bonnie come back to me?"

Matilda was gamboling happily through a field, young as when she first convinced Miss Honey, the Only Kind Adult In The World, to adopt her into her family and they became

sisters.

She held both of Miss Honey's hands and together they swung through the grass. The blurred foliage behind them was a green screen on which all she could see was Miss Honey laughing.

Jenny wasn't all that much of an adult at that was she? She was innocent.

At six, Matilda had the feeling she wasn't exactly innocent. Too many adult books swimming about her head and adult thoughts like revenge and responsibility crawling about in her mind like sea monsters. She used to become afraid of the things she knew about, like RAPE, DRUGS and PREJUDICE. She knew that little girls did not know these things. Miss Honey was like a buoy, innocent and airy with just the right amount of adult intuition to sooth the fears of a little girl.

They spun on the grass, looking into each others happy faces, knowing that they had finally found the one person in the world who understood them perfectly, for all that one was a pretty 21 year old teacher and the other was 6 year old girl with knowing eyes. They sang:

All around the mulberry bush
The monkey chased the weasel.
The monkey thought 'twas all in fun.
Pop! goes the weasel.

And Matilda wasn't so young anymore. She had learned that adults really are more rational than children, children who learned their prejudices from their parents and brought them unmercifully down on the genius girl, the witch girl, the girl who just last year had saved them from the worst Evil Step Mother in the world. But Matilda didn't care because she was too smart for their petty insults. And when she had cried at night, it was not because she was sad, it was because she was happy. She knew there was such a thing as happy tears because she had read about them in a book. But then why, why did they burn so much?

She was a very little girl crying silently in the dark, crying against the hate and the spite of everyday life. And then She came and enfolded her in warm arms and chased the monsters away with kisses to her head and face.

Every night in my dreams
I see you. I feel you.
That is how I know you go on.

Far across the distance
And spaces between us
You have come to show you go on.

Kissing her gently on the lips, parting them and probing into them with her tongue. Matilda felt herself becoming full of that inexplicable something, a heat that pressed behind her lids wanting out. The only image that remained on her mind was of Jenny, sitting on the porch and beckoning to her.

Shauna awoke on Sunday morning to a strange sight. 3 books, without string or tether, were revolving slowly above her head. She watched them for a while; convinced she was still asleep. The books whipped out of sight and landed with a thump somewhere on the other side of the room. Then two more appeared and Shauna entertained herself with reading their titles: Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea and In Search for Schrodinger's Cat, Quantum Physics and Reality. Schrodinger's Cat? It was too strange a tittle for a dream. She sat up and saw Matilda was busily putting away the books that lay scattered over the floor. She was humming the Titanic theme as she worked, sitting perfectly still on the floor and directing the books only with her eyes.

"Good morning," she said as Shauna sat up.

Shauna looked at the bookshelf, which they had lifted up and put into place last night before going to sleep, leaving the books scattered on the floor. The shelves were more than half way full now, and Shauna had an idea that Matilda hadn't touched one of them.

"I woke up with a lot of energy in me, and this seemed an efficient use of it," she said, not taking her eyes off the traveling books.

A feeling of amazement and exhilaration welled up in Shauna. Seeing the books happily floating back to their homes meant that miracles were possible. Last night had been traumatic, but a certain amount of skepticism had remained in her. The falling bookcase could have been the result of a very local earthquake. Floating books surpassed completely the realm of the possible and trespassed into the realm of the supernatural. The experience was both mind numbing and freeing at the same time.

"Do you know why you can do this?" she asked.

"When I was younger, we postulated that it was because I was so smart. I couldn't express my intelligence around my parents, who were absolute bigots, so it expressed itself through my eyes. But its different now. Then I could control when and how it came out . Now, if it wants to come out, it does, whether I want it to or not, i.e. last night."

By breakfast, Matilda's powers had subsided. Matilda, Shauna and Jenny discussed its reappearance as they ate French toast and eggs.

"I don't think it's come out for the same reason as before." Matilda told Jenny. "I was so frustrated then. I was literally becoming bored to death. That certainly is not the case now."

Reflecting on Matilda's demanding schedule in school, Jenny had to agree."

"Is there something different that you do now, that you didn't do before?" Shauna asked.

Matilda sucked on a straw leading into tall cup of orange juice, thinking hard. "I don't know. I cannot think of anything, well, except for you." She reached out her foot and had it slide up Shauna's leg. Shauna blushed, stuffing her face with food.

"And even so, it happened before that. Yesterday morning I thought my toothbrush had just fallen to the ground by coincidence, but now I am not so sure."

"You didn't tell me that." Jenny said, surprised.

"I was preoccupied."

"Hmm, I remember. You wanted to know why I wasn't dating anyone. Hey! I thought you said you weren't interested in anyone yourself."

"Well," said Matilda, primly, "I didn't know I was."

Matilda had a thought. Remembering back to yesterday she recalled what exactly had prompted her to ask those questions of Jenny. Specifically she remembered some dreams. Then she recalled that this morning she had also awakened from a somewhat intimate dream.

"Shauna, can I try something?" Before Shauna had a chance to respond, Matilda had leaned over the table and kissed her softly on the mouth. Stunned, Shauna reacted instinctively by leaning into and deepening the kiss. Matilda suddenly jerked away from Shauna, focusing her eyes hurriedly on an object and letting the power flow out of her. The object, which happened to be her own plate of pancakes, flew toward the wall and slapped against it. One of the pancake stuck for a couple seconds then slipped to the floor, leaving patch of glistening syrup in its place.

"I think I know what initiates the power," Matilda said, blushing brightly from the kiss that had been more intense than she had expected.

Shauna grinned, not able to keep the quip from escaping her mouth, "I see what they mean by explosive passion now."

Jenny let out a startled gasp of laughter which soon sent them all into a round of giggles and general silliness.