The Dragon's Daughter

Chapter 3

Saturday, 9:00 a.m.

Sy had asked me to drive him to Walmart on Saturday morning, and it was the only thing keeping me from the beach on such a beautiful sunny day. The sun was low enough not to scorch me and the breeze was just right. But Sy had been grounded from driving again. I didn't have the courage to ask why, for fear it would start him on an hour's long rant that vacillated from anger to depression. I made a terrible therapist. Why couldn't he just bury his emotions inside like I did? But regardless, I would always be there for my friends. Even if it meant being at Walmart. Besides, I did need some shampoo and a new lippie.

So that's how I found myself in the beauty aisle, swaying along to an old pop song. Sy was off getting the trash bags he needed to clean up his garage. I'd even gone so far as to offer to help him, but he insisted on doing it himself. Saying he only needed me to drive him for the Hefty bags and he'd take it from there. Sy sure could be stubborn at times.

I was in the shampoo section and decided to push the thoughts of Sy's garage out of my mind so I could thoroughly engross myself in deciding what new formula to try when I noticed something strange over my left shoulder. There was a person near the back wall, floating along above the maxi pads. His Walmart vest was open and draping down beneath him like a kind of weird cape. A millisecond after I noticed his form above me, I heard his friendly voice say, "Hey Raina!"

I jumped, hurling the Coconut Nourishing Shampoo bottle at him out of pure reflex, screaming like he was trying to murder me

. Despite the label that touted extreme protection and "the most nourishment available," I doubted he felt either protected or nourished because he hollered like I threw a grenade at his head. Hearing his shriek and watching him plummet back to earth caused me to scream all over again.

By this point, I realized who the heck I had just assaulted. It was Jeremiah Dobbs who was flying. And technically, in my defense, the shampoo didn't even hit him. It sailed past him, sending packages of sanitary pads cascading to the floor in a softly flooding avalanche. But my improvised projectile had obviously frightened him badly enough to cause a crash landing. His arms flailed around in circles, and he hit the floor, still shrieking. His body bumped the shelves with a dull thud, and even more maxis plopped down on his prone form.

I froze. My hands flew over my gaping mouth, my heart hammered in my chest. Had I killed him? I finally released a full breath and dropped my hands when I saw him shrug off a box of overnights with wings and blink at me with owlish eyes.

"What the heck?" he scowled at me.

"Ah?!" was all I managed to huff out, but I gestured to him and the air above where he'd been floating along like a parade balloon.

"Oh. Yeah, that." He grinned at me, then held out a hand, "Help me up. I think I broke a rib or something."

I approached him cautiously, but this was Jeremiah. I knew him. A year ahead of me, he had already graduated and was working here in the electronics department full time. He wasn't a psycho serial killer. The most illegal thing he did was pot. Granted, he did a lot of it for as long as I'd known him. But what? Was he going to grab me and fly away now? I chuckled nervously and reached out a hand to help him up.

"Sorry for, you know... the shampoo." I wasn't entirely sure what I was apologizing for. But there was a big mess in the aisle. And with both of us screaming our fool heads off, I wondered how we hadn't drawn a crowd.

"It's all good," Jeremiah said upon standing, his same loopy grin in place. "I suppose I shouldn't sneak up on people." He shrugged as if what just happened was normal.

"Y-Yeah," I agreed tentatively, hoping he would get around to telling me how in the sweet fancy Moses he was in the air. This was not normal. Why was he acting like he wasn't just floating in the freaking air?