ghost

[shesepankh]

Kindergarten teacher Renée Higgenbotham Swan (36) was killed in a car crash one mile from her residence in Phoenix, AZ, January 9, 2005. She is survived by her daughter Isabella (16). Her service will be held at -

Bella has the entire obituary pasted into a page of one of her compilation notebooks but tends not to re-read past the first lines. It's repellent. The concept of obituaries is repellent. The funeral is over. Renée's vibrant brief life has been summed up over the course of a paragraph, and is also over.

Bella pretends to sleep on the plane. Her neighbor is talkative and she doesn't want to say shut up, my mom just died, because - what if it doesn't work? What if this news doesn't have the power to bludgeon everyone else into stunned silence the way it does Bella?

Charlie collects her. Charlie hugs her. Charlie doesn't make her talk. Good wonderful understanding quiet Charlie does not say a word. He takes her home. Her room's where she left it last August.

It's raining.

Bella stays home, moving in, moping, for a day, and then she shows up at school, gray-faced and withdrawn. First class is English. Okay, whatever.

The teacher wants her to introduce herself. Bella wants to yank on the skinny end of his tie until he regrets making her.

She stands at the front of the room and says that her name is Bella Swan and she's moved here to live with her dad. The teacher makes an impatient go on gesture and she stands there for a moment before robotically saying the same thing she produced at the beginning of the year in her old school in Phoenix when they were doing go-around-the-room-and-share-facts. "I'm one of those people who actually likes Shakespeare."

He lets her sit down.

She sits.

Comments

[castmyown]

"She took off in fullform and switched to midform once we split up, so she could have thumbs and the phone."

[shesepankh]

"Makes sense. Is it hard to learn to fly?"

[castmyown]

"No, but it takes some practice. More than walking or running, as a quadruped."

[shesepankh]

"I'm pretty terrible at walking even with the feet I'm used to. Although I guess having more feet is probably a help all else being equal? I didn't feel exactly catlike and acrobatic, though."

[castmyown]

"You'd be able to at least glide, gliding's easy. Just keep your wings open and steady and bam, gliding. Having more feet usually helps, but not with stairs. Or at least my four delicate cloven hooves don't work with stairs, a lion's limbs might be different. They take practice, though."

[shesepankh]

"Practice. Right. At least there's lots of wilderness around. This would be harder if I were still living in Phoenix..."

[castmyown]

"A bit. The wilderness was one of the reasons we came here. Along with general out-of-the-wayness and pretty scenery."

[shesepankh]

"It has all three, yes, the traits are related. What time is it? I don't know how long I spent unconscious."

[castmyown]

Phone is checked! "Five thirty-four. I don't know when you fell unconscious, but I felt the - magic whatever it is that made me come looking about forty-five minutes ago."

[shesepankh]

"Okay. So this will have been a long-for-me but not ridiculous walk to take in the pleasant not-rain if I start back now. Don't want Charlie to worry."

[castmyown]

"Yeah. Do you want my phone number for magic lessons?"

The excitement's back.

[shesepankh]

"Yeah. And I guess I'll be over at your house a lot, at least until and unless Charlie takes the sphinxy news well enough for mine to be open."

[castmyown]

He nods. "Do you have your phone or should I try to find something to write on? I think I have a pencil, but I don't carry paper where ever I go..."

[shesepankh]

"I have it." She pulls it out, hands it over for him to add himself to her contacts.

[castmyown]

Which he does with little trouble.

"All right, then. I'll head home and we can have magic lessons later. I'm excited but you're the one learning, so - I'll just let you choose the times?"

[shesepankh]

"I'm excited too, but I want to, you know, try taking a nap and see if this is a weird dream I tell your actual human self about next art class, or what," says Bella. "If I wake up from my nap and I can still sprout a tail on demand, I'll call you then, unless you go to bed super early Friday nights?"

[castmyown]

"Fair enough. No, I don't go to bed super early Friday nights, but if it's after eleven I might be grumpy with you."

[shesepankh]

"Short nap," she assures him, "leftovers for dinner, phone call."

[castmyown]

"Okay!" he says brightly. "Then I'll head off."

Pause. Then he says, in an octave a teenage boy should not be able to manage, "Eeee!"

[shesepankh]

"Does Savannah not supply much outlet for magic geeking?"

[castmyown]

"She really doesn't, no one will magic geek with me and it's terrible."

[shesepankh]

"Well, I'll fix that. If any of this is real." She turns one hand into a paw, extends and retracts her claws, then turns it back and stands up. "It looks like I didn't get too far from where I was when I blacked out, but in case I'm mistaken about recognizing the place, can you steer me back to town?"

[castmyown]

Darren's now grinning. It may or may not just be his new permanent facial expression. "Yeah, sure." He points. "That way's to the closest road, if you take a left when you hit it you'll be back at the main town in no time. I forget the name of the road, sorry, I just saw it flying here."

[shesepankh]

"Thanks." Pause. "Do you know any other mystical creatures hereabouts?"

[castmyown]

"Aside from my sister? Off of the top of my head there's a few griffins around, decent people but kind of dull, and I think one of the teachers is a bugbear?"