A Rational Magic || ONC2022

One || Summer Surprises

"You're sure you have the tickets?"

"Yes, Anya, they're in my pocket."

Lani kicked her feet against her suitcase, paying more attention to the clock than to me. I tried not to focus on the sound of a car driving away, but it was impossible.

We were alone.

"So, it's gonna be here at... twelve," Lani groaned. "Early is on time and on time is late... and it's not even eleven. Do they want us to go missing or something?"

"Don't say that. They're our parents."

It's hard to be rational all the time, though.

Lani's the one trusted with everything — the money, the tickets, she's even carrying both our phones — as the older one between us. It's only five minutes, though her birthday is officially the day before mine. So most people think she's actually significantly older than me, when it really isn't.

She's also only got both our phones because she's wearing a jacket with inside pockets and I'm not wearing anything with pockets at all.

"D'you want to go to the shop?"

We're at the local train station, and the nearest shops are almost a twenty minute walk from here. This station is really just a ticket office, two platforms, and a bridge. And a newspaper bin. Which is about the most interesting thing.

"I'm not coming. What if it's early?"

"By... what, forty minutes?"

"Half an hour."

"Trains are never that early," Lani shrugs, standing up. "Besides, the next one's at half one. We can just get that one."

"Aunt Jessica is expecting us at something past five, remember, so we need the first train." Otherwise we'll get to where we need to change too late, and then to Terrenfell even later, because if we're late to Ercaster then we'll almost certainly miss the four o'clock. If we get this one at twelve, we should get to Ercaster at half-three, and then...

Yeah. That's what Mum and Dad worked out.

If we miss this one, we'll be far too late unless we try getting the bus to Ockmore, and that's an issue in itself. We've each got a suitcase with us, after all.

"I'll give you your phone, and you can call me if you need to."

After that, I pretty much have to let her go. Not without a couple of weak attempts at stopping her from leaving, and then a half-hearted request for a coke and a Kit-Kat.

I mean, if she's insisting...

The money's technically for when we get to Ercaster, in case the four o'clock is late and we want to get something to eat, but Dad went a bit much with the amount he gave us. We'd have enough to get something from... well, whatever they have in Ercaster Station, and some chocolate from the shops here.

We'll be okay.

Hopefully.

~|•

Lani gets back to the station with barely five minutes to spare before the train arrives — at 11:52.

It's only eight minutes early, nothing like the half-hour I was worried about earlier, but it's enough to warrant an 'I told you so'. Especially since Lani was right in the middle of saying 'it's rare for trains to even be ten minutes early here'.

"Shut up," she huffs as we wrestle with our cases, one pushing and one pulling, finally getting an adult from the F carriage to help us.

It's a good thing this station is such a pathetic one. If it was, you know, Ercaster, we'd probably have just been left behind.

Lani begins rummaging through the backpack we're officially sharing, though everything in it with the exception of one book is more accurately hers. There's some shared stuff — the money, for one, and a water bottle each — but it's mostly just stuff she couldn't stuff into her suitcase.

I might be the one who put off packing until last night, but she's the one who can't fold clothes so they actually fit.

"Did you pack seven weeks worth of clothes or something?" I ask as she pulls out a book of fairy tales. "That should have fit."

"It... well..."

Fairy tales.

I picked a murder mystery book, something interesting and (mostly) logical and sensible. Lani's taste belongs to fairies and mermaids and witches and all things magical.

All things that are most certainly not real.

The Law triplets in this series, though (yes, they are young detectives named Law) solve cases that could be real. There's very little implausibility in them: no curses and potions... although there are poisons sometimes. Obviously, it's a murder mystery series.

My favourite triplet is definitely Zander. He's the only boy, and probably the most logical of the lot. His sisters (Ophelia and Maeve) play along with the wild theories way too much, in my opinion. There's a whole plot line in one book where Ophelia seems to truly believe that the victim was killed by a witch.

And in fairness to her, he kinda was. Not by a magic-and-broomsticks sort of witch, obviously, but the point still stands. I suppose.

The best book is definitely the second one — Marked For Failure — in my opinion, though I currently have the fourth, Strike The Spectre, in my hand. It's probably my third favourite or something like that. And yeah, it sounds like an odd title, given the whole 'nothing that couldn't be real' thing, but it's also an awesome mystery. Seriously, awesome.

"Please tell me you didn't pack all of them."

"They're not that heavy!"

"You probably brought other books as well, there's like twenty in that series!"

"Nowhere near twenty, idiot."

I did bring other books, I can't just read The Triplicity of Law for seven weeks, but that's beside the point.

The point is that Lani is a massive hypocrite, because we both know that she almost certainly packed more books than I did. Without counting that one almost-full sketchbook she has either.

Of course, her books are mostly just more 'interesting' versions of stories she's read a million times before, but as she says, a mystery can't really be read twice and still be as exciting.

Rubbish, in my opinion, but I let it slide. She can rant about how good these adaptations of fairy tales are for hours, and I'd really rather not have to argue about it.

So we don't.