The Last Daffodil

5

5

I tried my very best to put the entire encounter out of my mind, but it was harder to do than I anticipated. Travis had crawled into my mind like no one ever had before, and it was hard to make him get out.

But when Quincy showed up at my house on Christmas Day, it was impossible to think of anything else.

"I heard you were giving my brother a hard time." It was the very first thing she said when I opened the door, I hadn't even had time to register who was standing outside my front door when the words came out of her mouth.

"I feel like I have the right to give you guys a hard time." I hated to admit it, but it was easier for me to be angry at Quincy. It was easier for me to glare and not have the urge to fall to my knees at her feet and tell her everything she wanted to know before begging her to be my friend again.

"If you understood anything about this situation, you would find it way harder to be mad at us." She said, shouldering her way into my house, taking in the large, white, plastic tree in the corner of the living room, which was covered in blue and white tinsel and ornaments.

"Well, if I understand so little, then why don't you just explain it to me?" I asked angrily.

"It's not that simple," she said, still admiring my festive living room.

"You can't just barge into my house after two months and tell me I'm dumb and that you can't tell me why!" I suddenly exploded. My raised voice seemed to make Quincy angry too.

"Oh, I'm sure I can come up with a few reasons why I think you're dumb. I just choose not to share them in order to spare your emotions."

I opened my mouth to yell again when my mom came into the living room.

"Quincy? Daff, you didn't tell me they were back in town." She smiled tightly, I was sure she had heard the entire argument and was pretending that she hadn't.

"They're not," I growled, glowering at Quincy.

"Actually, we are, for a bit anyway, we move around a lot, my dad's in the Navy." Quincy smiled broadly at my mom, also pretending that the argument had never happened. "It's good to see you again Mrs Montgomery."

"You too Quincy, so how long are you staying?" And with that, the two of them started a lengthy conversation of small talk, which I was successfully removed from, until Quincy suddenly seemed to have the world's greatest idea.

"Actually, Mrs Montgomery, can I steal your daughter for a bit? I promise to bring her home before dinner."

"Sure!" my mom didn't even hesitate, it was as if she thought this outing would magically bridge all the gaps between Quincy and me.

"Thanks," Quincy grabbed my arm, not even waiting to listen to my objections, and pulled me outside. To where her shiny black motorcycle was waiting. Of course she had a shiny black motorcycle.

"No." I said, trying to pull my arm from her grip with more force than before. "I am not riding on that."

"You wanted an explanation and I'm prepared to give you one if you're prepared to get on my motorbike."

I glowered at her. "I hate you." I spat.

"No you don't."

I got on the motorcycle.

***

The ride wasn't very long, but it was just as terrifying as I thought it would be. I swore that Quincy was taking the turns sharper than she needed to because she was mad at me. We stopped outside of a very ordinary house, on a very ordinary street on the very edge of town, the nearest house was nearly half a kilometre away. The only unnatural thing about the house was that it seemed a little lacking on Christmas decor.

"We're here." Quincy said. She seemed nervous, as though she was worried about what would happen when we got inside.

She led me to the front door and swung it open, it swung in silently, showing me a very mediocre front room. She took a deep breath and walked inside. I followed her, feeling her nerves.

She was walking ahead of me, so she reached the kitchen right before I did. I heard chairs scrape against the floor before I entered the room behind Quincy.

There were three people in the room. Travis, a tall, muscular man with salt and pepper hair and broad shoulders, and a very small woman with an enormous amount of flaming ginger hair.

"Quincy." The little woman said, greeting her happily. She had a very strong southern accent. Travis looked directly at the floor after seeing me. The man however, seemed very concentrated on me.

"Quincy," he muttered tightly, "who's this?" He sounded faintly Scottish, or maybe Irish.

"Aeneas, Christiana, this is Daffodil Montgomery." I could feel both sets of eyes suddenly land on me, but Travis had looked up from the ground at the same time that I had looked in his direction. We made eye contact, and his face didn't seem as hard as it did before. He almost looked sad.

"Oh." Christiana said, and Travis pulled out of our heartbreaking staring contest to look at her.

"Why did you bring her here?" Asked Aeneas, his voice on the verge of shouting.

Quincy was more meek than I thought she was capable, she seemed terrified of making anyone in this room angry. But she still spoke her exact opinion.

"Travis and I saved her life, she was approached because of it. I feel like she has the right to know the truth."

Christiana looked at me as though the idea of me knowing 'the truth' broke her into pieces. "But she seems so young. So..." She stopped, looking for the right word.

"Close minded? Unimaginative? Unable to possibly believe the truth?" Aeneas supplied, angrily, barely keeping his voice below a shout. Christiana looked sympathetic, but didn't correct him.

"I'm not close minded or unimaginative. I got top marks in my creative writing class in grade eleven." I said, offended. "I think I can handle whatever 'truth' you're talking about." Christiana opened her mouth to explain, or insult me again, I wasn't sure, but Travis beat her to the mark.

"Daff," he said, sounding on the verge of crying. "There are things about this world that people like you can't possibly understand. Things that not even the greatest fiction writer has ever contemplated to be true."

"Wha... What do you mean?" I felt scared now; scared of what they were talking about, scared of the way they were looking at me, scared of the tense atmosphere in the room.

"Daff," Travis took a deep breath. "I understand how crazy this sounds, and I'll understand if you don't believe me at first, but please just listen and hear me out."

"What is it?" I could barely even whisper.

"Daff," Travis looked me directly in the eye and wasted no time in saying the words that came next. "Magic is real."