Breaking Down Walls

17

     Toby ran around his house trying to help clean it to his mother's standard because they were expecting guests for dinner. As he went and grabbed all the knick knacks that he had left around in random places, Sarah watched him from the dining table where she was cutting up fruit for a fruit salad. 

   She smiled and spoke to Karen who was also at the tale putting together shish-kabobs at the same time "You know we would probably be done by now with his help. Plus it's a cookout in the backyard, I don't think they'll see all the rooms that your having him pick up."

  Karen laughed as she kept skewering meat and veggies "Yes but we would probably end up with less than half of the food left for everyone. This way he's actually picking up his own messes and burning up his excessive energy."

   After Sarah and Toby continually meeting up with Tala as she walked Beorn in the park for the past few weeks, Karen and Robert had wanted to meet their new friends and their family. Toby was excited and was planning different activities for the meet up while Sarah also excited to spend more time with her young friend but could tell that underneath their parents suggestion was a hidden pool of worry, concern and protectiveness. Even though a couple of months had passed the police couldn't find any evidence of the person that rammed into Sarah and no one could figure out why Sarah had been targeted. At least on the mortal side of the investigation, Sarah had some clues from her friends as to why she was attacked. Though the reasons given to her were just as vague as her memory of her accident because even they were having a hard time figuring it out.

  Sarah kept slicing the fruit as she tried to not feel too guilty of not telling her parents what really happened but how do you explain that a dark shadow had attacked you and probably the only reason you survived was thanks to Goblins that only you and your brother could see. She would be back at the hospital quicker than Hoggle running from the bog of eternal stench if she told anyone that. Not only that but that she was pretty sure that she still had Goblins around her and Toby that tried to stay hidden and stay a secret.

   Sarah huffed out a small laugh at some of the antics her secret guard tried to do sneakily while giggling loudly enough that Sarah and Toby could hear them easily. Though they were different from the ones that usually visit her and Toby, while Sarah hadn't seen her new bodyguards but the feeling they gave off seemed older, stronger, and wiser than their regular visitors. Sometimes when she was having a hard time pushing her wheelchair, she would feel invisible hands helping her push her chair or when Toby missed one of the steps to his tree house and fell, he was caught and slowly set to the ground safely. Though Sarah laughed at a memory of the  different people who had tripped on seemingly nothing after talking to her in a way that showed that they thought she was stupid now instead of just stuck in a wheelchair or the ones who ended up covered in paint or water, though they were mostly the ones of the opposite gender, who had approached her with an idea of being her saviour now that she was in a wheelchair. Not that she minded some of them getting hit but the Goblins sometimes couldn't tell which ones were actually hitting on her or the ones that were actually approaching her to check up on her as a friend. While most of them laughed it off as coincidence,  some of them started avoiding both her and Toby like they had the plague. Each event was followed by stifled laughter that only she and Toby could hear. Though she could swear that she saw both Karen and her Dad sometimes reacting like they heard the laughter but then again she didn't see them react any of their other visitors. She tried to leave out treats that she knew goblins like as a thank you for their help. She was a little annoyed because the goblins that still visited her refused to tell her why she now had an invisible guard or who had ordered her to be guarded. She had a pretty good idea of the who but she was confused on why he cared and why he didn't actually contact her personally instead.