Picking Pomegranates

When The Earth Moved

 She moved her finger over the touch pad of her laptop, and the screen saver went away to reveal her desktop.

It was a picture of her in a bikini on a beach in Athens. It was the summer she had turned eighteen. Her grandmother had went to visit relatives there, and had dragged Spring along with her. Well... not dragged. She had actually been quite thrilled to be going and she had had a marvelous time. That is until her grandmother's sister, Crazy Aunt Tilla, had found her alone.

It had been the last day of their trip, and Spring had went outside to enjoy the warm Greek afternoon sun. She was basking in a sarong and bikini top in a beach chair when Aunt Tilla had plopped down beside her. Well, she hadn't plopped. She had moved quite gracefully for someone of eighty years. She sat right down in the sand beside her, and watched the waves crash against the beach.

She hadn't said anything to her since they had arrived a week ago, so it had startled Spring when she had spoke then.

“It's almost time you know,”

Spring had pushed her sunglasses to the top of her head, and glanced over at her.

“Time for what, Aunt Tilla?”

Aunt Tilla had smiled, and Spring noticed for the first time the dimple in her left cheek.

“The Awakening,” Tilla had answered, giggling like a school girl.

Spring remembered lifting herself onto her elbow, and smiling indulgently.

“Of course it is, Aunt Tilla.”

Tilla had leaned over in the sand, and started piling it in between her hands.

“When the time comes, child,” Tilla had whispered. “You must be ready.”

Her grandmother had warned her of this.

“Aunt Tilla is prone to mad ramblings about nothing,” she had told her. “Just smile and nod.”

That was what she had done then, smiled and nodded. But that hadn't been enough to dissuade her crazy aunt.

Tilla mumbled something, and Spring had leaned over to hear her better.

“He comes, he comes, he comes....”

Tilla's hands had been moving rapidly, she remembered. Piling the sand higher and higher. It seemed as if she was trying to make a sand castle.

“Who comes, Aunt?” she had asked, and that had been her mistake.

Tilla had lunged for her, grabbing her face. Spring had been too stupefied to scream. She had watched aunt's eyes bore into hers, eyes that were surprisingly free of any madness. Clear green eyes that were the same color as Spring's own had gazed at her.

“Daughter,” had came from Aunt Tilla's mouth, but the voice hadn't been hers. “He is coming for you soon. When you come of age... he will come for you. Like the fires of hell, he will come for you with a heat and a burning passion!”

And then suddenly, as if drained, Aunt Tilla's hands had dropped from Spring's face. She had slumped backwards into the sand, laying an aged hand to her head. Her eyes had closed, then blinked back open. Confusion had marred their depths.

“I---where am I?”

Her voice had been back to normal. Shaken, Spring had called someone from the house to come and get her. The last she had heard, they had admitted her into a home.

Moving her cursor across the screen, she navigated her way through her computer's memory. She clicked on a hidden folder which she had backed up on several portable thumb drives, as well as several storage websites on the internet. It was simply labeled “Thesis” and it was password protected.