78: Wise Beyond Your Years

 Adele

     I numbly follow Aunt Pam and Uncle Simon into the house while Uncle Simon carries my passed out daddy. My hands still feel just a little warmer than normal.

     "I'm a witch, Adele… and so are you," I hear Aunt Pam's voice in my head. I used some strange power to hurt Daddy, even if I didn't mean to. I'm evil, I think to myself as we all climb the stairs to Daddy's room.

     "He just needs to rest, that's all, but keep an eye on him for a minute," Aunt Pam tells Uncle Simon. Then, she turns to me and asks to speak to me in my room.

     I nod, and we both make our way across the hallway and into my room before I go put on my old necklace and sit on my bed. Aunt Pam pulls the chair away from my desk and sits in it. I wait to see what she has to say.

 

    

     Tentatively, she starts. "On the beach, you said that you were bad, but you're not."

     "I hurt Daddy," I point out.

     "True, but it was unintentional, fueled by an out-of-control anger."

     "Is Daddy a witch too?" I ask, wondering that since Pam is one and I'm one that Daddy must be one too.

     "No," she answers, surprising me. I scowl. "Your mother is though," she continues quietly like she's apologizing.

     "And she's evil. So I'm evil," I state.

     "Adele, it's not a matter of being 'good' or 'evil'! It's what you do with what you've been given that determines that," she says with more emotion in her voice.

     "How can hurting people be good?" I ask angrily.

     Aunt Pam takes a deep breath. "Let me try to explain it to you. Through the centuries, they came up with three different categories, um classifications, for the different inherent abilities witches possessed. Just for clarification, we use colors to name them: white, red, and black. I don't know why they chose those colors, but they still stand in as the way to differentiate. I guess, now that I think about 'why,' I guess you could say that for black, imagine everything around you scorched and burnt. For white, imagine a blank canvas. I honestly can't think of a reason for red. Maybe they thought that was a good middle of the spectrum."

     "Which one am I?" I ask with already a guess in my head.

     "I'm not positive, but I have a guess. First, let me describe them. Black witches have a higher aptitude for destructive spells. White witches have a higher aptitude for constructive spells. Red have a little of both without a strength in either. Aunt Lynne is a red witch."

     "Aunt Lynne's one too?" I ask, surprised but happy that there's someone else.

     "Yes," she answers.

     "So, which one do you think I am?" I don't want to tell her my guess until I hear hers.

     "I think you're a black witch, judging from the power of what you did. Plus, your mother is one."

     My guess was right.

     "So, what? I just go around destroying things like it's my job?" I snap.

     "No!" she answers me like she wants me to think that idea is crazy. "You're only seeing the bad. There's good in destruction."

     "How?" I ask in a snarky tone.

     "Well, imagine there's something bad coming at you. Imagine a swarm of locusts or whatever are about to destroy your crops. Zap! They're gone, and you save the day."

      I give her a look like I think she's crazy and say, "There's aren't any locusts around here."

     "That was just an example, the same one my mother gave me, and that's why I thought of it. Also, there's usually a better rebirth after destruction. Think of a previous lava flow. What it leaves behind is a great place for new, stronger plantlife. Think of a phoenix."

     "So I create the ashes. Fabulous," I say sarcastically and fall back onto my bed, having yet another reason to hate the one that gave birth to me. "And you're a white witch and that's why you were able to so easily cure Daddy," I guess aloud.

     "Yes, but that wasn't what I'd call easy. If that's what you did without conscious effort, you're very powerful."

     Maybe I'm more powerful than that awful woman that left me and Daddy. Maybe, one day if she ever shows up again, I can blast her off the face of the earth, I smile with the thought.

     "Why haven't you told me this before today?" I ask.

     She slowly explains it to me. "Because we weren't sure. We like to keep a low profile, as you can imagine, and we didn't expect you to show signs until a little older than now. I'd already started trying to figure out how to tell you since most figure it out at thirteen, fourteen, not as much fifteen and beyond. I guess, you could also say, I didn't want to accept that you're growing up, so I kept you as a child in my mind. And I'm sorry for that."

     I sit up to say in a resigned way, "It's fine. As you said, you didn't know and weren't ready or expecting it yet." I think up another question. "Um… What would've happened had you not been around?"

     She looks sadly at me but with widened eyes as she answers, "Your dad would've spent days screaming as his own immune system would fight it like the worst burn imaginable, and it's doubtful even morphine would work to ease the pain. You must've been furious."

     My lower lip trembles as I say, "That was the maddest I've ever been in my whole life, and I said it was his fault." I start crying.

     She hops up out of the chair and sits next to me to hold me in her arms. "People lose their tempers all the time and say what they don't really mean." She pets my hair.

     "But I still think it's partly his fault," I say, feeling horribly guilty.

     "It may be that it is, but will that stop you from loving him?"

     "No," I answer immediately. My dad has always been there, even if he's been sad and trying to fight it in his own way. I figured that out last year after spending the third night in a row at Aunt Pam's house. He didn't want me to have to see him sad and how he dealt with it. I knew that Daddy still loved me because of how he was when we spent time together but that he needed something to take his mind off what that woman did to him. Ever since then, I've been a lot more patient with Daddy. "And I'd say he's gotten enough punishment for pretty much ignoring that woman after what he'd told me. I'm glad Erin's here."

     Aunt Pam hugs me tighter for a minute before she whispers, "Me too."

     She brought my daddy back, I think and cry more. I was patient with him, but I still missed him, and now he's back.

     "I'm mad at him, but you're right. That doesn't mean I don't love him. I'm mad, but you can't change the past, so I've gotta get past it," I tell her, thinking aloud.

     "You're wise beyond your years," she says thoughtfully.

     "I grew up a lot today, I think." I suddenly remember Todd. I guess that was my first kiss. And my second.

     I quickly sit up more and look around Aunt Pam for the necklace where I'd dropped it on the floor. I don't immediately see it, so I get up and go look around.

     "What is it?" Aunt Pam asks.

     "The necklace. It's gone," I say, feeling melancholy. He must've picked it up and taken it.

     "Aren't you wearing it?" Aunt Pam asks and points to the necklace around my neck.

     "Oh yeah," I lie like I'd forgotten, not wanting to tell her what happened. My shoulders slump, and I say, "I'm tired. I think I'll go to bed now."

     "We'll talk more later, okay? I'll let all this soak in for now," she says and gives me a hug before kissing my forehead.

     "Okay," I say, nodding my head. She leaves the room to probably go and check on Daddy again.

     Once I've been in bed a while, Daddy walks in.

     I sit straight up and start immediately apologizing. "Daddy! I'm sorry! I didn't know! I was mad, but I didn't mean to hurt you! It's not all your fault! I'm so sorry!"

     "Shh!" he says and pulls me across his lap. I cry and hug him back. "I know, sweetheart. You think I'm the first parent that's gotten that accusation from their child before? Nope," he tells me, saying the 'nope' like Uncle Jesse would. "And I know you didn't mean to do that. I tried to tell you that before, but I was too exhausted."

     "Your hands are cold," I state, finding that weird.

     "Are they? That's what Erin said too," he muses.

     "Is she okay?" I ask, realizing I hadn't wondered that yet.

     "She's a little shell-shocked, but I think, I hope, that she'll be okay."

     "So, she knows," I state in a questioning way.

     "Yes," he answers.

     "Do you think she'll be afraid of me now?"

     "No, not unless you give her reason to be. Will you?"

     "No, but what if I do something on accident again?" I feel like a ticking time bomb.

     "Aunt Pam and Aunt Lynne will help with that. I wish I could," he tells me wistfully. "Don't worry." He reaches up with his ice-cold hand and strokes my cheek.

     "Daddy, give me your hands. They're freezing." I ask, and he does. I stand up off the bed for better balance as I hold them. They don't look blue. They're cold enough that they might be blue, but they look normal.

     "Why are they like this?"

     "I suspect it's a leftover from what Aunt Pam did. It'll probably go back to normal after a while," he answers while I keep looking at his hands.

     Could I? I think in regards to a quick thought that I might be able to fix it if I just used a tiny bit of whatever I did earlier. But what if I just hurt him again?

     Well, I'm not angry. He just needs warming up. These cold hands bother me. It's not right.

     I close my eyes and imagine my hands getting really hot, and they do.

     "What are you doing?" Daddy asks, surprised. "Your hands are very hot all of a sudden." He pulls his hands away.

     "Let me try something." He won't trust me.

     Daddy takes a deep breath and gives me his hands, and I smile happily.

     I close my eyes and imagine my hands getting really hot again. Then, I imagine that heat slowly going into Daddy's hands. This is scary, and I worry I'm just crazy and pretending. I keep going anyway, and Daddy's hands return to normal. I lessen what I want to go into him, but his hands start getting hotter anyway. Opening my eyes wide, I completely stop trying to warm his hands up, but they still get hotter. They're not burning me… yet.

     "Do you feel that?" I ask and hope he knows what I'm talking about because I have no idea how I could describe it to him.

     His brows come together like he doesn't want to say what he's thinking. Suddenly, an electrical zap comes between our hands, and we both pull away at the same time.

     "Did I hurt you?" I ask, extremely worried.

     "No, but I did feel something besides your hands getting hot and besides the shock. How did you do that?"

     "I don't know," I answer. "I'd stopped what I was doing when the zap happened. I think anyway."

     Daddy gives me an 'I have no idea' almost-grin. "Do my hands still feel cold?" he asks and puts the backs of his fingers against my throat.

     "No," I say with a smile. "I destroyed the little bit of ice still left in your hands."

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That whole "black, red, white" thing isn't my idea, far from it. But, I decided to use it because it'll work for me. I personally got that from the Dragonlance series of books that I read as a teen, but I've also seen it in the Final Fantasy stuff.