Rimwick

Specific Power

By the time night, like a thick blanket of ash, has settled over Rimwick, my army backpack is neatly stuffed and my nerves are tingling with excitement. I have so many questions- where are we going? When do we leave? Why didn't I know about this other place before? - but Mom is prancing around the kitchen like some sort of fairy princess and isn't answering any of them.

"Mom. What-"

"Sh, Riley. It's dark."

"Right. That's why I-"

Suddenly, the breath is knocked out of me and I double over, gasping for breath. My vision goes blurry. I see vague shapes, shadowed and infernal, writhing in an elongated pattern. They surround me, making my vision darker and darker, until I almost collapse in on myself-

I sit up, gasping.

"What the dusk was that?"

Something is still wrong with my vision. The words I've said- what the dusk was that- look like they're floating in front of my face. Slowly, the letters dissipate into the air.

"Mom?" I ask, scared, and that word appears too.

"It's okay, Riley. This is just your power, that's all."

"My power is making flippin' words appear in front of my face?" Once again, the letters shimmer into existence, then dwindle away like a candle flame.

"Hmm." Mom studies the words. They're kind of pretty, in a freaky, abnormal way, glowing slightly in the kitchen's warm light. Each word is a slightly different size, and each one is a different color. Some are block letters with tiny flecks of glitter in them. Some are scripted in flawless calligraphy. All of them are neater and more exquisite than what I could write by hand.

"Try touching one," Mom says. "I haven't dealt with this specific power before, but my guess is that seeing the words is just a side effect. You can probably do more than that."

"Okay," I reply, and jab at the skinny, yellow-colored okay with the tip of my finger.

It explodes.

"Mom," I groan. The flash of light was quick and painless, but exploding words is hardly better than seeing them written in the air.

She laughs. "Try another word, maybe a simple noun."

This is ridiculous. I think for a moment, then say, "Firefly."

The word itself is cute, scrawled in the air in delicate purple cursive. But when I touch it, the purple morphs into a body and wings, adds flickering yellow light to the end, and flies towards the kitchen ceiling before vanishing.

"Whoa!"

Mom hugs me. "That was beautiful!"

"Yeah, it was. What else can I do?"

Mom laughs, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye. "I'm not sure. That was just guess work."

"What do I do now, then?"

"Well," she says, "it's night."

And she throws open the front door.