In the morning, things were not to back to normal.
Jack woke up normally. He tried to remember what day it was. Saturday. Yeah. He shook his head. He got out of bed and stretched. He was still holding his staff. Suddenly he remembered the weirdness of last night. No, not last night. It had been a dream. Then how had he gotten home? Everything was a bit fuzzy. He put those thoughts out of his head and went upstairs for breakfast, purposely not checking his reflection in the mirror.
When he stepped into the kitchen, he could tell something was wrong. Emma was eating her cereal with her head down. Instead of bustling around the kitchen, their mom was sitting at the table, looking oddly still.
"Are you going to go to school today, Emma?" She asked quietly.
"I guess so."
The conversation ended there, even though their mother was usually chatty. And it was Saturday, why would Emma be going to school?
Jack realized he was standing still in the entrance to the kitchen. He walked in with a cheerful "Good morning!" Hopefully he could cheer them up, whatever was wrong. "What's for breakfast?"
Nobody responded.
"You'd better get going, Emma." Their mom said. Emma picked up her backpack and opened the front door.
"Hey!" Jack said, "Do I at least get a hug?"
Emma didn't even look up.
"Hello? Emma, what's wrong?" Jack ran over and crouched in front of her. She stepped forward and didn't even touch him. She went straight through him. As if he wasn't even there.
He gasped and stood up, stumbling back and out the door in shock. He looked at Emma. She kept walking toward the bus stop, head down. Jack was breathing quickly, scared of what had just happened. Was he still dreaming?
His mom closed the door behind him. "Hey!" He tried to open it, but it was locked. He wondered…. If Emma walked through him, could he pass through solid objects? He tried walking through the door. It didn't work. What was going on?
Jack wandered down the street, pondering his situation. The wind was still tugging at him. He wondered what had happened. He seemed to have changed, that much was obvious. His appearance had changed. He was pretty sure he was now impervious to cold, as he had been walking in the snow barefoot for a good hour now without being bothered.
He absentmindedly tapped his staff against a tree. He heard a little crackling, and turned to the tree to see frost spreading in an interesting pattern across the bark. He ran his hand over it. He tapped another tree and more frost spread from the tip of his staff. He smiled and started to laugh. If this was a dream, it was a cool one.
He kept walking, examining the way his staff glowed where he touched it. The wind kept pulling at him. It was pretty annoying, actually. He finally gave into it. As soon as he let himself relax into the wind, he was soaring above the houses.
"Woah! Ahh- hahaha!" He laughed in delight.
He found that the wind carried him on it's own, but it often followed his thoughts if he told it where to go. He flew above the city for several hours, forgetting the weirdness of earlier and teaching himself to ride the wind.