Sage assisted her parents in packing up the last of their luggage, although the last bag was oddly heavy. She attempted to pick it up but struggled significantly, only for Mr. Turner to take it off her hands and effortlessly load it into the truck. Taking her phone, earbuds, notebook, and pencil case out of her backpack and into their 2017 Ford F-150, Sage put on her worship playlist and leaned her head against the window. Beside her, Ava sat in her carseat, entertained by the tablet that was nicely taped to the back of the driver's seat. Of course it wasn't exactly stable, and had to be replaced with new tape every two weeks or so. Slowly, Sage's eyelids become heavy and closed. She dozed off, letting her thoughts absorb into "Reckless Love", from Cory Asbury.
After what seemed to be 5 minutes, Sage's eyes fluttered opened, she found herself still seated in the truck, but surrounded by buildings. Strange buildings that she didn't recognize, are we in town already? She asked herself.
"How long was I asleep?" She inquired to her mother who was deep in conversation with Mr. Turner and seemed unaware of her 13 year old questioning her from the back seat.
After giving up on trying to talk to her mother, Sage crossed her legs and opened her notebook. Looking through her many pages of sketches and writings, she struggled to find a blank page. The moment she did, it was torn off, she closed the notebook and used the hard cover as something to draw on. Sage began drawing on the new paper, what she thought the new house would look like.
Just as she finished the rooftop details, it seemed as it the seat was shifting backwards beneath her. The truck moved up a steep hill and drove into a garage.
"We're here!" Mr. and Mrs. Turner chorused in a sing-song tone. They spun around to face their two children, grinning from ear to ear while doing what looked to be their best try at jazz hands. Sage rolled her eyes at her enthusiastic parents while Ava clapped wildly and giggled, erupting tiny spit bubbles that evolved into drool. Sage cringed and forced herself to look away. Ava's drool had always disgusted her.
Sage emerged from the truck, and analyzed the garage, it wasn't that bad, but it had seen better days. Cracks ran throughout the roof and across the walls.
Mr. Turner walked to the door that led into the townhouse and rang the doorbell.
"The people are still staying here?" Sage wondered out loud. Distractedly, her hands flew up to the side of her forehead and began braiding a small section of hair.
An woman answered the door, she seemed about mid-thirties with short, messy, dirty blonde hair.
"Hello," she said tiredly, "I'm Nancy, and you must be the Turners!"
"Thats right," Sage's father spoke up, "I'm Kyle, this is my wife, Arianna," Mr. Turner's face glowed with adoration as he spun on his heels to face to Ava and Sage. "And these are my two daughters," he grinned widely. Almost as wide as his cheerful grin earlier. "Ava, and Sage."
"It's nice to meet you." Sage stated, whilst Nancy shook her hand vigorously.
"Nice to meet you too," Nancy agreed, suddenly a realization hit her. "Oh! Right, please come in." She stepped swiftly to the right so that the Turners could make their way inside, dragging her seemingly invisible four year old son that Sage hadn't noticed until then. The child looked directly at Sage, his eyes grew round with fright and quickly followed his mother after glancing at her other family members. Sage tried to give him a brief warm smile as she walked past, following her mom, despite her friendly attempt, she got yet another negative, frightened response.
Sage sighed and trudged up the stairs along side her mom. Taking one glance around the room her eyes widened. Toys were strewn across the living room, clean folded laundry piles were knocked over and spread across the untidy hallway, dishes pile up in the sink, what seemed to be strawberry jam oozed from an open jar, that lay on its side, resting on the kitchen countertop. Cardboard boxes were distributed in random place across the room, it seemed as though a herd of elephants had stampeded across the hardwood.
Sage examined the rooms astonished by how messily the house had been kept.
"We're still in the process of packing," Nancy explained while maintaining the same fake, cheerful grin that remained plastered on her features. She clasped her hands tightly together, "would you like a quick tour?" She offered, extending her arm and gesturing to the hallway and several other rooms of the house.
All of the Turners nodded slowly, murmured their agreement and followed Nancy, who guided the group cautiously across the danger zone of a living room.
"Here is the single bathroom," Nancy explained while walking past the also unkept, compact bathroom.
Whoa, Sage gaped inwardly, did a hurricane hit the bathroom?
"Moving on," Nancy continued down the hallway, "On your right is the larger of the two guest bedrooms"
"This will be Sage's room," Mrs Turner stated, casting a small grin at Sage, which she returned slightly.
Sage glided into the room, she twirled into the great space, the paused abruptly. The walls were stained bright olive green. Sage grimaced, turned towards her mother and sighed deeply. Green? Really? She mouthed to Mrs. Turner in a hushed murmur.
"Nothing a little paint won't fix." Her mother sighed, shaking her head and chuckling softly.
Nancy shot them both a quick horrid look-which Sage picked up on immediately-and proceeded on with the tour. After some more extensive touring, Sage noticed that she was suddenly struggling to keep up with the group, her steps became dragged out and exhausting. Each room began to seem farther from the next. Thankfully, there wasn't much more house left to see. Ava had also grown sleepy as well and insisted on being carried through the last bit of the tour.
"The house looks great," Mr. Turner stated after viewing the final room, "we should probably check into our hotel soon. Do you know when we'll get the keys?"
"Next Thursday." Nancy replied shortly, who seemed eager for them to leave, almost beckoning them to get out of the house. To her joy, the Turners left and piled into the truck.
"What did you think of the house?" Mr. Turner asked the girls, glancing hopefully at Sage and Ava through the rearview mirror.
"It was okay," Sage answered calmly, fiddling with a few stray strands of hair. Ava bobbed her head rapidly in agreement. Sage chuckled slightly, her parents soon joined her, the atmosphere shifted from tense to relaxed. Sage sighed in content, a wide grin spread across her face. This was the first time in a few months that they had really been able to laugh together as a family since Cameron's loss. Looking back to the first depressing few weeks after the funeral, Sage realized how far she and her family had come. They were still grieving Cameron immensely, but they had been able to take their focus off of how bad things were him. This was a step, it was small nonetheless, but at least it was in the right direction.
