Lost Together

Chapter 1

"You've won again! You know, I think you're cheating..." said Myron to Alma, while they both played a card game.
"I'm not!" said Alma, laughing.
Myron shook his head and smiled, beginning to hand out new cards.

Jack was there too. He was laying on his bed and looked out the window, his arms crossed behind his head.
It was raining heavily and Jack listened to the sound of the raindrops falling against the sheet of glass.

Soon, all the three were interrupted by their parents, yelling at each other.
Alma covered her ears, while Myron worriedly watched the open door. Their parents have been acting strange a lot lately. They've always been mad at Jack, but never at Alma or Myron. But this time it was different. This time they didn't greet Alma like they would always do, when the three came home from school.

Jack sighed, got up from his bed and walked over to the door. He quickly closed it and turned around to face his siblings.
"We should better go to sleep now." he said and nodded to the card game on the floor, telling them to put the game away, before their parents would see it.
"But Myron and I just started a new round!" said Alma and covered all the cards with her hands, when her brother wanted to take them away.
"Look, mom and dad wouldn't like it, if they saw you playing a card game at this time. " Jack said, as he bent down to them and tried to take his sister's arms away, so he could start picking up cards.
"Fine..." Alma gave in and pulled her arms away from the cards.
Then all three began to put the cards into a box and went to their beds.
They all had their beds in one room. Jack's bed was next to the window, while the two other beds were near the wardrobe.
Alma jumped onto hers, and took the blanket to cover herself. While Jack was doing the same as Alma, Myron turned out the light and walked back to his bed.

They stayed quiet for a while, until Alma began to say something.
"I can fly." she said and sat up a little, revealing her face from underneath the blanket.
Myron laughed a bit. "Humans can't fly, sister."
"But I did it yesterday!" then Alma groaned and said: "You'll see. I'll show you tomorrow, because I'm really tired right now. Good night." Alma quickly laid back down again and threw the blanket over her face.
"Okay then. Good night." said Myron and Jack, who already tried to sleep, just hummed in reply.

<—————>

Jack couldn't sleep.
He kept remembering his father's words.

You will never come far in life.

I'm really disappointed in you, Jack.

You're a failure.

Why can't you do something right for once?

And the boy believed all of that.
Jack wasn't the best and often came home with bad news from school. But he still tried everything to make his parents proud, which never really worked.
He looked over to Myron and then to Alma.
From his two other siblings, he was the one, who never got any love from their parents. Maybe once when he was little, but he didn't remember. He didn't need to remember. If they really loved him one day, it didn't matter anymore.
Unlike him, Alma got all the love. Even if she did something wrong, it wasn't bad or anything.
Every time, they would come home from school, their parents would ask her how her day was, smiling at her.
Jack never experienced something like this. The only thing he got, after coming home, was a death-glare from his father and sometimes, something way worse. But it depended on what had happened that day.

Alma began to move in her sleep and mumbled something.
Jack kept looking at his sister.
Would their parents love him, if she wasn't there?
He shook his head quickly. Jack felt ashamed for thinking about something like this, but lately he's been thinking about this really often.
To get away from his awful thoughts, he laid down again and tried to fall asleep.

<—————>

"Jack! Wake up, brother!"
Myron was standing next to his bed, shaking him violently. "Alma, she- she can fly!"
"What?..." Jack said half asleep and tried to open his eyes properly.
"I-I don't know what h-happened. She jumped out the window a-and-" Myron stumbled over his words and stared to the window, where she left her clothes. They saw a peregrine falcon outside, flying in circles.
Jack rubbed his eyes, got up from his bed and trudged over to the open window. And then he held out his arm, and began to call Alma's name.
The little peregrine falcon stopped what it was doing and screeched happily. Then Alma flew towards Jack's arm and sat down on it. He carefully carried her inside and looked at Myron's confused face.
"Oh my god. What is happening? How is this possible? D-did you know about this, Jack?!" Myron asked and put his hands on his cheeks.
Jack nodded. "I can do that too. I don't know how, though." He walked over to the wardrobe and opened it.
"Wait, what?! Is she going to stay like this forever?!" Myron shrieked, hoping he was just dreaming.
"Keep your voice down! No, she should be able to transform back. Give me her clothes." Jack replied and held out his other arm to Myron, while Alma hopped down and into the wardrobe.
Myron was near to freaking out, but still handed Alma's clothes over to his brother.
"Okay Alma, knock on the door, when you're back to normal." said Jack, putting her clothes inside too and closing the wardrobe door.

Suddenly, Myron flinched when he heard their parents' footsteps, coming closer to the siblings' room.
"Oh no." he whispered and his face went pale. And so did Jack's.
"Come on, sister. Please hurry." Jack said to the wardrobe again and sometimes looked back at the door, making sure their parents haven't come in yet.

But then the door slammed open and their parents entered the room.
"What did you do now, Jack? Where's Alma?!" his father shouted at him, while he stepped in front of him. They seemed to have heard Myron, who was probably talking a little too loud a few minutes ago.
Jack started to shake and backed away a little. With trembling hands, he tried to wrap his hands around the doorknob.
"Answer. Me." his father said, taking another step forward.
"Sh-she's inside the wardrobe." Jack finally answered and then he opened the door, revealing their sister as a bird inside.
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(Okay so, I might be a little slow with updating this story, because I still have to work on the other one. I just really wanted to start writing this one.)