Chapter 2

Drenched in sweat, Mark jolts up into a sitting position from his bed. Taking a second to collect himself, he looks at the clock.

13:00

Seeing that he woke up late, he hurriedly stands up and grabs a new pair of clothes, muttering,

“That stupid nightmare again…how many times has it been now?”

Arriving in the restroom and setting his clothes on the counter, he turns on the cold shower. Hopping in and rinsing himself off, he does his routine morning shower; shampoo, rinse, body wash, rinse. Turning the shower off and shaking off the excess water, he dries himself with a towel and puts the new clothing on.

Opening the restroom door and walking out, he sees Ryan walking past the door. Ryan, seeing that Mark got out of the shower, smiled at him and patted his shoulder. Joyfully, Ryan asks Mark,

Looking at Mark, a grin surfaced on Ryan's face. He walked towards Mark, then asked,

“Are you excited for tomorrow? It’s your thirteenth birthday! You can finally awaken! We’ve been waiting for this day for forever!”

Smiling lightly, Mark replies, “Yep, it does feel like it has been forever. We still have to prepare for the awakening though, since some of the materials need to be fresh.”

Nodding his head, Ryan exited the hallway, entering the living room. Mark followed Ryan into the living room, watching Ryan exaggeratedly plop down on the couch. Shaking his head at Ryan's antics, he then walked to the kitchen, passing by the dining room along the way.

Opening the fridge, Mark grabs the milk, eggs, and some syrup. Setting them on the counter, he opens the cabinet next to the fridge. Mark then takes out the flour, vanilla extract, ground cinnamon, salt, and some sugar.

Turning on the gas stove, Mark grabs a large bowl and a whisk. Pouring in the flour and proceeds to whisk the milk in. After checking to make sure it looks fine, he whisks in the rest of the ingredients.

Unwrapping the bread he made the day before, Mark slices off six loafs and wraps it up again. After soaking the four loafs in the bowl, he sets them on the heated pan. After another minute or so, he takes them off and takes out two plates, two forks and two knives. Plating it all, he pours some syrup over the bread and sets it on the table. Calling out for Ryan, Mark yells,

“Food’s ready! Hurry up before I eat yours, too!”

Chuckling, Ryan yells back, “Alright, I’m coming!”

Realizing he forgot to pour some drinks, he walks back into the kitchen, grabs two cups, and fills them up with water. Setting them on the table, he sits down and waits for Ryan to arrive.

Arriving at the table, they both eat the toast. Finishing the food, Ryan rubs his stomach and says,

“That was some good grub. I’m beat.”

Lightly smiling at his comment, Mark gets up and puts their dishes in the sink. Seeing Ryan walking to the front door, he asks,

“You are leaving? Where are you going?”

Ryan smirks and says, “I’m going to get the materials for your awakening, dummy.”

Slightly blushing in embarrassment at the fact that he forgot about that, he facepalms.

“Alright, see you later than!” Mark waves him goodbye.

“Ciao!”

After watching Ryan walk out of the door, he turns on the television and watches it for an hour. Getting bored of television, Mark starts to clean the house to pass the time. A few hours later, hearing the door open, he checks the time on his phone.

20:00

Setting down his cleaning supplies, Mark heads to the door to greet Ryan. Seeing Ryan struggling to carry all of the stuff, he laughs and helps him carry some of it. Bringing all of the materials to the living room and setting them down, he looks at Ryan and says,

“Thanks for going to get all of this.”

Grinning, Ryan replies, “No prob, it’s not worth mentioning.”

Looking around the house, Ryan notices it was cleaner than when he left.

“I should be thanking you for cleaning the house. I despise cleaning it with a burning passion.”

“It’s fine, there was nothing else to do while you were gone so I cleaned to pass the time.”

“Couldn’t you have played some games or watched the TV?”

“I did watch the TV but got bored after a while. As for the games, I am too excited for tomorrow.”

“That makes sense,” Ryan replies.

Looking at all of the stuff on the counter, Mark notices a small, unassuming, dull grey orb. Shock filling his face, he asks Ryan,

“Where...how did you find an Orb of Space?”

Laughing at the face Mark is making, Ryan smiles widely and replies,

“It was something your father left for you. He told me to only let you know about it the day before you awakened. Ain’t got a clue why he made me wait, though, so don’t ask me.”

Waking from his stupor, Mark smiles and shakes his head. If it came from his father than it makes sense. After all, he had a lot of influence, so it wouldn’t take much effort to buy one.

Since it was late, Mark went to the kitchen and prepared some fried rice and pork dumplings. Plating it all, Mark remembered to get pour some semi-sweet earl grey tea to go along with it. Seeing Ryan eagerly waiting at the kitchen table, Mark chuckled and set the food and drinks down. Ryan, with stars in his eyes, immediately dug into the food without waiting for Mark, to which Mark smiled.

Half-way through Mark finishing his food, he looked at Ryan who had already finished eating. Seeing the grains of rice around Ryan’s mouth, he unintentionally laughed.

Ryan, clueless of the rice on his face, asked, “Whatcha laughing at? Is my fact that funny?”

Struggling to contain his laugh, Mark replied, “You h-have rice on your face..hehe”

Ryan conjured a gust of wind to blow the rice off of his face, and then wiped it with a napkin. Stretching his arms and getting up, he walks over to the couch and sits down on it. Turning on a movie, Ryan pauses it and waits for Mark to finish the dishes and get some popcorn.

Setting the popcorn on the coffee table and heading over to a reclining chair beside the couch, Mark sat down, reclined the chair all of the way, and put the footrest up. Unpausing the movie, they munched on popcorn as time flew by.

When the movie ended it was already 23:30, and they were both tired and excited for tomorrow. Smirking, Ryan says,

“Alright, I’m exhausted. I’m going to sleep, goodnight, Mark. Hope the bed bugs bite.”

“I hope they bite- no, eat you too. Goodnight, Ryan!”

Heading to the restroom in his bedroom and brushing his teeth, Mark changed into some pajamas and tucked himself in. Tomorrow was finally the day that he has been waiting for...the day that Mark would awaken.