The Missing Piece of History

Chapter 2 CATHY: STRANGERS FROM OUR BIRD CAGE

The next morning, I woke up and got  ready. I climbed down the stairs to  the living room, where I saw my mom and dad busy with their morning  works. My mom, Helen Wilde, noticed me and greeted me with her usual cute smile, "Good morning, darling." I saw her meddling with things in the kitchen.

My dad, Robert Wilde, was wearing his gold framed pair of spectacles and was reading his newspaper. Both my parents had beautiful black eyes and brown hair.

"Hello, sleepyhead," greeted a voice from inside the study. That familiar voice belonged to my one and only sister, Sweety. She was reading her high school books. She was a bit taller than me. She had long black hair and attractive black eyes, traits that I shared with her.

"Good morning, brainyhead," I replied with a teasing look on my face. Though we had a difference of two years in age, we used to tease each other over every silly little thing. 

But that day, she didn't react to my comment and instead went on with her books. That had been happening for a while. Actually, that had been happening for the past couple of years. That must be the effect of high school, I guessed. I was worried about joining high school next month. 

We had been living in Pleasanton, a small city in California. The phrase 'Home Sweet Home' suited us perfectly. We owned a small home, which was sweet and comfy. The small garden outside our home made it more pleasant. My mom was a professor in the field of Atomic Science and my dad was a Meteorologist. Though they were  busy people, we used to have breakfast together.

Once we finished our breakfast, my mom asked, "Cathy darling, would you go pick some apples from our tree?"

"Sure, mom. Be right back," I replied and rushed up the stairs.

We had the tree right in front of our home and it was very tall. I had to go upstairs to reach them. And so I did.

While I was upstairs, my eyesight fell upon the empty bird cage. It was once filled with chirping birds but not anymore. It had a huge door, big enough for any human to pass through. We used that door in case we needed to clean the cage.

As I was about to near the apples tree, a sudden breeze blew my black hair over my face, which brought back the weird memories of the day before. That plant and the breeze . . . You are just imagining things, Cathy. Such weird incidents don't happen. Just when I thought things couldn't get any weirder, I heard a small thud sound in the empty bird cage.

Slowly, I moved towards the cage in order to check the reason for that  noise. As I was about to touch the lock of the door in that cage, I was startled when I bumped into something and fell down.

It was not something, it was a girl. A girl with beautiful, blonde, straight hair and I noticed that her sea-green eyes bore into mine. She was wearing a pink shirt with a matching short skirt. She appeared all of a sudden and out of nowhere. 

She looked at me and waved her hands in an apologetic manner saying, "Sorry! I didn't expect you to approach this way." She reached out her hand to help. I didn't know what to do.

Who is she?

As I was wondering, she took my hand and pulled me up. I was shocked. Once I got up, I jerked myself from her and stepped back.

Then, I saw a glowing light behind her and a boy emerged from it. He was taller than her. His round, black eyes and his big eyebrows gave him a funky appearance. He wore a green sweatshirt.

Who are they? Aliens, perhaps? But they look so human-like. This is so not happening. Should I shout for help? Should I call my sister? Why am I doing nothing? Do something, Cathy. And I did the first thing that came to my mind. I started to run back towards the staircase.