Chapter 32

Michael

It was hot in here. I didn’t want to get up yet. But it was so hot!

I slowly opened my eyes, staring straight up at the orange and grey tarp that covered my tent. I could see silhouettes of ants and cockroaches climbing up the tent, looking desperately for a way in so they could find me and eat me alive. Evil little buggers.

I reached for my phone next to my sleeping bag. It was nearly dead but had enough juice to still tell me the time. 8:03 a.m. I groaned, putting my phone down. I wanted a couple more hours of rest but sleeping in was nearly impossible while camping in Arizona. The sun had only been up for an hour, but it had already transformed my tent into a man-sized oven.

With a sigh, I sat up, unzipping my sleeping bag a little. I rubbed my eyes and glanced down at my bare chest. My ribs felt much better today. Angela and I had been camping out here for the past few days, and most of the time I relaxed with my powers on, letting my ribs heal as fast as possible. It wasn’t instantaneous, but much faster than it would’ve been without my blue stone.

I reached into my pocket. Yep, I thought. It’s still there. My meteorite was cool to the touch, and felt as ordinary as any skipping stone, but I treated it as if it were a sacred relic. I had formed a habit of checking on it often. Losing that stone would be miserable. I’d have limited powers like Angela had for most her life. And I admit that I’d become addicted to using the powers the stone granted me.

I closed my eyes, imagining the top of a roller-coaster ride, and the ball of energy in my gut burst, spreading its tingling power through my limbs. It felt so good. Without my powers on, I’d felt so weak and fragile. And I had my powers on pretty frequently the past few days, so it felt weird whenever I turned them off—which was basically whenever I slept.

Okay, I thought. It’s too hot in here.

I put on my clothes, unzipped my tent, and stumbled out. Angela was already up, sitting next to the fire. She looked up to me and laughed.

“Nice hair,” she said.

I frowned, brushing through my hair. It was all over the place. “Um… thanks.” I said, embarrassed.

She laughed again and turned back to the fire. I tilted my head as I gazed at her.

Even though neither of us had used a proper bathroom the past few days, she still looked stunning. Her light brown hair streamed out from under her Yankees ball cap, her smile was soft and inviting, her eyes were a tasty, chocolaty brown. She was tall and slim, with all the right curves in all the right places.

Not only that, but she was super awesome too. I mean, she was a Super Chick! Not many of those around, last I checked. And she was so assertive, decisive, and productive. Attributes I admired so much because I desired them myself. And she was smart, an astronomy nerd just like me. I couldn’t get over how cool that was!

She shot a glance back at me, an eyebrow raised, obviously aware that I was totally checking her out. I started, stumbling over a rock, waving my arms, trying to catch my balance. She chuckled under her breath. “Careful, Michael,” she warned. I caught myself. Was there a second meaning in that?

“I made you some breakfast,” Angela said, handing me a paper plate full of eggs, sausage, and hash browns.

“Awesome! Thanks!” I said sincerely, as I slumped in a camping chair next to the fire, trying to pretend nothing had happened a few seconds ago. “I didn’t know you were such an expert at cooking.”

“Oh, I’m not,” she corrected. “Just an expert at camping.”

I thought back to the burnt-fish-sticks smell at her house.

“How are your ribs?” Angela asked as she forked some food into her mouth.

“Better. Much better. I think I’m feeling good enough to run into the city today.”

“Good to hear, but we’ve got enough supplies out here to last us a couple more days.”

“Yeah, but I was thinking about going to the city for something else.”

She tilted her head. “Oh yeah? What’s that?”

I took a moment to swallow my food and leaned forward in my chair. “I’ve got an idea, Angela. And I think it stems off what you told me the other night about being a good Starling and breaking the law.”

“Mm hm?”

“Your dad said there are dozens of us Starlings. In the Western States, Canada, and Mexico. Chase Whipple showed us news reports of other Starlings. Some of them robbing banks and some putting out forest fires. Some good, some bad. What if we could get in contact with them? Form a team?”

“Like a super hero squad?” Angela said skeptically.

“Yes, actually. We could gather together with the good ones, so that together we can stop the bad ones.”

Angela swallowed a slice of sausage. “It’s not a bad idea, but it sounds a little too idealistic to me. How are we supposed to find them? And just the good ones?”

“They will come to us,” I explained. “And this is the best part. What we do is come clean to the media.”

She stared at me for a moment. “You mean turn ourselves in?”

“Sorta. But, not to jail. No. We tell the whole world who we really are. That we really have powers and want to use them for good. We tell them what your dad told us about Starlings. That there are more super humans out there that are too powerful for humans to stop.

“We use the media to give a warning to the people and to call the Starlings to us. The good ones. We can say that this is the gathering place for them, a safe haven. If we do that, and the people see that a big group of us really are good, then maybe they will stop sending cops after us. And maybe they will let us live among them with an agreement to not bother each other. That way… we could return to our homes, our families, our lives. Yes, everyone will know that we’re super humans, but we will just learn to get along.”

Angela frowned as she thought about it. “Won’t that also attract a lot of attention to us and to Tucson?”

“For sure,” I said. “Every bad Starling will know to stay away from this city, making it the safest place on earth.”

“What if the bad Starlings start attacking people in other cities?”

“Then we will run over there and stop them,” I said, putting my plate down and gazing into the fire. “Maybe that will be part of the agreement we make with the people. We will protect the world if they will let us break some laws in order to do so.”

“So,” Angela said, rubbing her chin. “We will basically be superheroes without a secret identity?”

I thought about that and nodded. “Yeah, or the police for the Starlings. The Starling Police. You know how cops are allowed to speed to catch a criminal? It’s the same idea here. We will be given leeway to break some laws, so we can catch the superhuman criminals.”

Angela gazed at the fire, slowly nodding. “It’s a good idea, Michael. Sounds like quite the adventure, but do you really think you and I should spearhead this? We’re both only sixteen years old after all.”

“I turn seventeen in a month.”

“Okay, but my point is… do you really think that we could gather a group of Starlings and fight other Starlings across the nation? I mean, you and I both had a hard-enough time stopping Ray. We may be super humans, but we’re not fighters. We’re not police. We’re just teenagers. I got my driver’s license six months ago!” She brushed some of her hair out of her eyes. “And some of the Starlings out there may be adults. Who knows who could have touched those stones? What if some psychopath serial killer got a stone and plans to murder thousands of people? Could we really stop someone like that?”

“Probably not,” I admitted, looking away from the fire and at her. “But that’s why we need a big group of us. Together we should be able to stop anyone.”

She turned away from me, stewing over my idea as she played with the fire with a stick.

I rested my hand on her shoulder. She looked at me, concern in her eyes. “I know this will be very dangerous,” I said. “And life-risking. But, it’s better than just hiding from the world out here, hoping everything will turn out well while Starlings are popping up left and right. This is the only way that I can think of where I would actually feel like a good Starling. Like the hero my dad wants me to be.”

“Heroes?” Angela said softly; not in a skeptical way, but more in a “I can’t believe this is finally happening” way. She wore a big grin, imagining the idea. And then she frowned. “There’s one problem we have to deal with first, before we can make Tucson a safe haven for Starlings.”

“What’s that?”

She threw her plate in the fire. “Ray Simmons. Last night, after you went to sleep in your tent, I stayed up listening to my portable radio. I heard that Ray robbed a bank yesterday. The police have no idea how to stop him. There was talk about bringing in the National Guard.”

“Ooh, that could get ugly.” I threw my empty plate into the fire and stood up. “This could be our chance, Angela. We could prove to the people that we’re good by stopping him.”

“And how do we do that? Yeah, we’ve got a good chance because it’s two on one, but he didn’t stay down after our last fight. How do we keep him down? Kill him?”

“No,” I said. “By taking away his stone. Without it he can’t use his powers, and we can let the police throw him in jail.”

She nodded, looking at the dying fire, thinking about it. “Okay. Sounds like a plan. I hold him while you go digging through his pants.”

“Please don’t say it like that.”

She snickered as she slugged my shoulder. “Well one thing’s for sure. If we’re going to have a face-off with Ray, then we need to practice.”

I looked up from the fire and noticed Angela’s eyes were glowing. She wore an evil grin.

Before I knew it, I was shoved off my feet and sent rolling through the desert dirt and rocks. I sparked my powers to life and climbed to my feet, trying to gather my bearings. What was going on? I looked back at the fire. Where did Angela go?

I heard something thundering from my right and turned just as Angela pushed me to the ground again. I lay on the ground for a while this time. “What are you doing?” I stammered as I got to my feet. It took me a while to find Angela. When I finally found her, she was standing in the distance with a bundle of rocks in her arms, tossing one rock up and down, her eyes glowing.

“Practicing,” she said with a teasing smirk. “Here, catch!”

She chucked a rock at me, and man, could she throw! Even with my superpowers, that rock flew too fast for me to bring my hands up. I barely managed to dodge it as it zipped past my face and nailed a large cactus, completely toppling it over.

I looked back at Angela, bewildered. “What, are you crazy?” I yelled. “Are you trying to kill me?”

“C’mon, Orion! Let’s see how tough you are!”

She flung the rock at me, and it was still faster than I’d expected. This one pegged me in the shoulder, knocking me off balance, but just for a moment. The rock didn’t hurt as much as I thought it would. It was more like getting hit by a dodgeball. When I looked back at Angela, another rock was soaring my way.

I dodged it just in time and saw the next one fly. Angela was throwing rock after rock at me. This is a crazy way to practice, I thought. But I’ll play along.

I felt my powers surge as I lunged toward a rock, my goalie instincts kicking into gear. I caught it with one hand; it stung, but only a little. I caught the next one with my other hand.

Angela threw a few more. I punched the first two with my fists, knocking them to the ground, and I spun and kicked the third one into the air, losing sight of it as it sailed above the clouds.

I looked back at Angela. She still wore her playful smile, her eyes glowing. At first, I thought this was crazy dangerous, but this was actually a lot of fun!

I quickly picked up a few more stones nearby. “Alright, Cygnus. Your turn!”

I threw three rocks at once with one hand, not at full strength—I didn’t want to hurt her—but hard enough to make her run for her money. I’d expected her to dodge them, since there were three coming at once, but she had a better idea.

Her grin disappeared and was replaced with a focused expression. Her eyes suddenly shifted to a deeper white color, and with an explosion of light, glass-looking wings appeared out of nowhere and circled around her. The three rocks thudded against the wings, each one splitting into tiny little pieces.

I could see Angela through her transparent wings, deep in concentration, her arms out to her sides, as if they controlled the wings’ movements.

“Whoa,” I said out loud, dropping the other rocks in my hand. I sped over to her and stopped a few feet away from her wings. “These are so cool…” I reached a hand out to touch them. Angela didn’t seem to mind.

They were warm to the touch. They looked like they were made out of glass, intricate feather carvings throughout, like they were made by an expert glass-blower. But they were too flexible and indestructible to be glass.

“They’re not so much wings, as they are force fields,” Angela said, reading my thoughts. “They’re made out of pure energy, but solid and smooth. I’ve tried to figure out the science behind it, but it’s too complex.” She swung her arms downward, next to her thighs, and the wings followed suit. With a grinding sound, the wings cut through the desert ground as easily as a knife through butter, until they rested at Angela’s sides, mimicking the movement of her arms, the tip of the wings buried ten feet underground. “All I know is that it works,” she said. “Almost like magic. I’ve never been able to summon them for long periods of time, until now that I’ve got my stone.”

“Angela,” I said, gawking. “You have force field wings… that is so cool!”

She smiled proudly. “Yeah, it’s pretty cool, won’t lie. Problem is…”

She started pumping her arms up and down, and her wings did the same, blasting dirt and pebbles with huge gusts of air. I raised an arm to protect my eyes as the air blew all around me. After a moment, Angela stopped flapping her wings, standing in the same spot, her lips drawn to a line, looking disappointed.

“They don’t fly,” I finished for her, understanding. “It’s because they’re not connected to you. They can blow a lot of wind, but it doesn’t give you any thrust.”

She nodded somberly, her wings disappeared, her eyes returning to their normal dull white glow.

“How do you summon them?” I asked. Angela raised an eyebrow. “The wings? How do you get them to appear? And your eyes glowed white…”

“It’s weird,” she said, hesitating a moment, and then continued talking. “I have to think back to a memory I had back when I was nine. The first time the wings appeared. Mom and I were caught in a storm while we were out hiking. It started to hail, and there wasn’t anything to cover us nearby. Mom was getting hurt and I wanted nothing more than to protect her from the hailstones. Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, the wings appeared around the both of us, blocking us from the storm. I didn’t even realize I was using my powers until I got weak and passed out moments later, and my mom carried me to shelter.”

She paused for a moment. I hadn’t heard her talk about her mom much. “After that,” she said, looking up at me. “I tried for months to get my wings to reappear. And finally, they did, when I thought back to that memory. It hurt to use my powers, but I was so fascinated by the wings, I just wanted a glimpse of them. I wanted to fly with them so desperately. It wasn’t until now, that I’ve gotten to fully test them out.”

I hummed, folding my arms. “There’s got to be a connection.”

“Hmm?”

“A connection between your powers, my powers, Ray’s powers, and every Starling’s powers. You’ve got force field wings. Ray can throw fireballs. And me… I don’t know what I can do.”

“I saw the balls of light that came out of your hands during your fight with Ray,” she said.

“Yeah, that was weird.” I started pacing casually. “And I don’t know how I did it, or why it happened, and I don’t know how to do it again. And I’ve thought back on when it happened several times, just like you did for your wings, and nothing has happened.”

“Hm,” Angela said, folding her arms. “It took me a while to get the hang of it. When I think of the memory, I have to really convince myself that I’m there, and I have to feel it. That same feeling I had to protect my mom and…” With a deep humming sound, her wings reappeared, surrounding both of us. “Voila!”

I looked around at the shimmering wings, impressed, and gazed back at Angela. I couldn’t help but realize how close we were to each other, inside the comforting dome of her wings. She wore a soft smile, looking back into my glowing eyes. We held each other’s gaze for a while.

She broke the gaze and dismissed her wings, but still wore a grin. “Hey,” she said walking past me, patting me on the shoulder. “Let’s keep practicing.”

“Okay,” I responded half-heartedly.

“We’re going to play a new game,” she said turning back to me. She slowly strode toward me, grinning at me the entire time, exaggerating her hip and shoulder movements. “This one involves some… personal contact.” She drew very close, shifting her attention to my lips, and she started to lean in! I raised my eyebrows. Is this really happening? I thought, my heart racing. I closed my eyes and leaned in too.

Then, she pushed me away, causing me to stumble. I opened my eyes, confused.

“Tag! You’re it!”

And she burst into a run, leaving me in a gust of wind and a cloud of dust.

I stood there for a moment, baffled and sputtering. She kept running through the desert, dust trailing behind her. I chuckled to myself and shook my head. She definitely knows how to play with my head, I thought. I narrowed my eyes, smirked, and leaned into a sprint.

The world seemed to slow down as the tingling in my legs increased, causing me to speed down the rocky hill toward Angela. I was gaining on her, but very gradually. I tried to stay out of the dust she kicked up, but sometimes it was impossible. I had to squint my eyes and hold my breath while running through the dust clouds.

Angela rounded a crater. I think this was the one where I found my stone. Two days ago, we’d discovered the third crater and found nothing inside. Either someone took the third stone and left town, or there was no stone in there to begin with.

Our campsite was basically at the same place where Angela and I had gone stargazing on our first date. Red Knoll was the hill Angela and I were speeding down. Short bushes and tall cactuses were the main vegetation we had to run around. The ground was rocky and uneven, which made it hard to stay balanced while running, but we hadn’t fallen yet.

Instead of rounding the crater like Angela, I leaped over it, landing close to her. She yelped when she saw me so close and increased her speed, just staying out of arm’s length. Her Yankees hat fell off, letting her hair flap wildly behind her, but neither of us stopped to pick it up. This was a chase!

She glanced at me from over her shoulder and laughed, a playful grin smearing her face. She weaved between tall cactuses like a downhill slalom skier. I kept on her heels, amazed that I hadn’t tripped yet. I’d never run this fast yet! True, we were playing games, but playing with another Starling was helping me test my powers and become more familiar with their limits.

Angela jumped suddenly, flying higher than a Las Vegas hotel. She came back down and landed with a thud, causing the ground she landed on to cave in and form a tiny crater, but she didn’t stop running. I had to catch up to her. Her jump had moved her further down the hill.

She leaped again, soaring even higher this time. I bent my knees and jumped after her, hoping to catch her midair. I went up and up, higher than I’d ever jumped before. Angela had jumped higher than me, staying far out of my reach. When I looked down, I gasped. That was a long ways down!

I plummeted to the distant ground, my stomach climbing up to my throat. It was intense and thrilling, but I felt confident that with my powers I could land on my two feet, just like Angela had. Sure enough, my feet pounded into the ground, forming a crater around me. My momentum carried me forward, causing me to stumble, but I caught myself and kept running.

Angela landed her jump and sprang into a higher one. She looked like a tiny dot in the sky, a speck below the clouds. I flung my arms this time as I jumped as high as I could.

“Woo hoo!!!” is what I screamed going up, and “Aaahhh!” going down.

Angela spun in the air and looked back at me, grinning from ear to ear. She laughed as she plummeted back to the earth, her T-shirt, jeans, and light brown hair flapping in the wind. Even though I’d jumped as high as I could, Angela was still dozens of yards higher than me.

We came down, forming our craters, and then went back up. It’s strange to think that we were having so much fun playing tag and jumping around. Most teenagers don’t do that, right? But superhuman teenagers do. Why? Because it’s a blast!

I needed to jump higher!

As I approached the ground, I prepped myself for the biggest jump ever. The tingling sensation increased within me. It felt like thousands of tiny rubber balls started bouncing around my stomach; it was like the feeling I got when cliff diving, that pivotal moment just before jumping into a fifty-foot free fall and splashing into a cold river. You couldn’t think about it. You just had to do it.

Just after Angela jumped back into the air ahead of me, I hit the ground hard, forming another crater, allowing my knees to bend. I extended my legs, springing into a massive leap. Something peculiar happened in this jump. The tingling feeling from my powers did something unusual. It… moved.

How do I explain this?

My powers had always felt like that electrifying, invigorating, tingling sensation. The tingling would spread through my entire body as I used my powers, and the tingling would intensify in the limb that was in use. When I punched, my fist tingled the most. When I kicked, my feet tingled more. You get the idea.

But, this time, when I jumped with everything I had, I felt the tingling actually escape my body. The tingling, like millions of miniature airsoft bullets, shot right out of the soles of my feet. It didn’t hurt, and the tingling within my gut didn’t subside. Just, some of the tingling—or the physical, invisible essence of my power—was forced downward, which launched me upward like a human rocket.

I was surprised by the power in my jump, and almost screamed like a little girl, but I’m glad I didn’t.

I raised my eyes skyward as I soared, keeping my gaze on the clouds high above. I stretched my arms vertically, which seemed to help me cut through the wind resistance. Whoa, I thought. I keep going up!

Mid-jump—somewhere around the height of the Eiffel Tower—Angela watched me soar past her, a look of amazement spread across her face. “Hey!” was all I could say as I whizzed by with a quick wave.

I glanced down at the distant ground below, amazed by my height. I looked back up and closed my eyes just before colliding with a white cloud. The air around me grew moist for just a moment, and then I popped out of the cloud, the sun reappearing in the eastern sky.

As I came to the peak of my ascent, there was a long moment of weightlessness. A sea of white clouds spread below me. The air felt cooler up here, even though the sun was unobscured and shining brightly. It was a view I could never forget.

I’d seen the tops of clouds from an airplane, but it seemed much more surreal—more personal—without any windows to block my view. This is what I imagined heaven looking like.

Then I started to fall.

The sun disappeared as I sunk into the clouds, suddenly becoming blind… and wet. The wind resistance pushed me into a spin, flipping me end over end as I fell.

I didn’t scream. I was too terrified to scream.

I reemerged below the clouds and caught a glimpse of the quickly-approaching, rocky ground. Could my body handle a fall like this? I wondered.

I knew what I needed to do. I needed to get my powers to move out of my body again. I needed to fly.

I spread out my arms and legs, which stopped my spinning and left me facing the ground, belly-to-earth position. If I was going to make this work, I needed to do it fast. I closed my eyes and concentrated on the tingling in my gut, trying to get it to shoot out my feet like it had before.

Nothing happened.

Only a few seconds left.

I yelled at my powers, “MOVE!”

Still nothing.

I curled up into a ball just as I made impact with the earth. With a loud crunch, my whole world stopped.

But I wasn’t dead.

The wind got knocked out of me, which hurt a lot, but that was it. No broken bones. No concussion. I finally regained my breath after rolling into a sitting position and looked around, grateful to be alive. Grateful to have superpowers. Getting hit by Ray hurt ten times more than that had.

Angela suddenly appeared in front of me, skidding to a stop, a dust cloud blowing over us. “Michael!” she said enthusiastically, extending a hand to pick me up. “That was amazing! At first it looked like you were flying! And then…”

“And then I dropped like a rock!” I finished for her as she helped me to my feet. “But I think you’re right! I think I figured out the secret to flying! You’re it, by the way.”

She scrunched her face. “I’m the secret to flying?”

“No,” I said, patting her hand. “You’re it. You know. Tag?”

“Oh, who cares? Tell me how you flew!”

“Well, I…” I paused, brushing the dirt off my clothes as I spoke. “I made the tingling move.”

She just looked at me for a few seconds, her mouth half open. “What?”

“You know, the tingling that spreads through your body when you use your powers? I made it move out of my body.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Isn’t that what you feel when you use your powers?”

“No,” she said flatly. “It’s more like… pressure, for me.”

“Pressure?”

“Yeah. Not painful pressure, though. It’s kinda like my body is filled with air, like a balloon or an air mattress, and it makes me feel lighter on my feet.”

I frowned. “That’s weird.”

“Not as weird as tingling.”

“Okay, so our powers feel different, but I think the idea should be the same. Take that pressure feeling you have, and push it downward, all the way out of your feet.”

“And how do you do that?”

“I’m not entirely sure, but that’s what I did to jump so high.”

Angela stared at the dry ground, deep in thought, her eyes still glowing. She seemed to be concentrating on her powers, trying out my idea. After a moment she shook her head and groaned. “Doesn’t seem to be working.”

“Maybe we need to try it while jumping. That’s how I got it to work last time.”

I closed my eyes and bent my knees, focusing on the tingling power in my gut. I sprang into a leap, but tingling didn’t budge. I fell back to the earth, a long distance to fall, but not nearly as far as before. I landed with a deep thud on both feet and jumped back in the air, trying to move my powers again.

Angela joined me in the practice. We wore smiles because it was thrilling, but we also kept our eyes straight ahead, focused on our powers. From a distance, someone watching would’ve thought we looked like two giddy teenagers jumping on a giant trampoline.

I need to put more into the jump, I thought. That’s how I moved my powers last time.

As I landed on the ground from a Statue-of-Liberty-sized leap, I flared my powers, flung my arms upward, and launched high into the air.

I felt it again. For only a brief moment.

The tingling passed right through the soles of my feet, pushing me skyward. It wasn’t quite as high as my last jump, not enough to reach the clouds. I closed my eyes, concentrating on my powers. I bent my knees and brought in my arms, as if prepping for another jump midair. I flung my arms upward and sprang my feet downward.

Nothing happened.

I tried it again. Nothing.

I reached the peak of my ascent, forming a small arc. I desperately tried a midair jump again.

It worked!

The tingling feeling shot out of my feet, thrusting me upward. It was a short spurt of power, but it was enough to get me close to the clouds. Again! I thought.

I performed another midair leap—which probably looked weird, like a breastroke without any water—and it worked again! I shot into the cloud, my vision turning gray and the air feeling damp.

I’m getting the hang of this! I thought. Now I need to make it more consistent.

I had gone into pure practice mode like I had many times on the soccer field. I just needed to keep on trying and trying until I got better and better. And I’d never felt more determined to practice than right now on this. I mean, c’mon… I was flying!

Though, it didn’t feel much like flying. It felt more like doing burpees in the air. It was exhausting like burpees too. I was breathing hard, grateful for the cool air provided by the cloud. I performed another midair burpee the tingling shooting downward and launching me upward. I emerged above the clouds and squinted in the sunlight.

That’s it! I thought. It’s like another limb! My powers are like an extra appendage that I can move around me, but just like any untrained muscle, it takes work to make it stronger and more coordinated.

With that realization in mind, I closed my eyes and focused on my powers, treating it more like a third arm than an abstract power cloud in my gut. “FLEX!” I shouted out loud.

The tingling moved! And this time it stayed in place!

I stopped moving. The stillness caught my breath. I stood on top of the clouds, the sun pouring down on me.

The tingling sensation had moved out of my body and remained below me, creating an invisible platform for me to stand on. Not all the tingling had left my body, just a small portion. I still felt the majority of it coursing through me, keeping me strong.

I didn’t want to move. I felt like I had when I first learned how to juggle—once I finally got three balls in the air, I didn’t want to stop because it was so hard to start back up again. I kept my arms spread out to my sides to help me balance. My powers fidgeted a bit, making me wobble.

The tingling was no longer shooting out of my feet. It was like a chunk of my powers dropped out of my body and formed an invisible cloud below me that continued to shoot downward. I couldn’t see it, but I could sense it just like you can sense where your pinky toe is even though you can’t see it.

I was about to attempt movement when I heard someone screaming. Was that Angela? I paused as I noticed the screaming was getting closer.

Suddenly, Angela poofed out of the clouds to my right and kept soaring upward. She was screaming out of pure joy. She flew in an arc above me and landed gracefully on the white cloud I was standing on.

I gawked. “How did you…”

“Pick it up so fast?” she said as she strode toward me, the cloud vapor parting around her as she walked on air, the wind blowing her hair to one side. I kept on gawking. “It’s like riding a bike. I have very faint memories of flying as a child, before my dad took away my stone. I thought they were just dreams, but no, they were real!”

I tried taking a step toward her but stopped myself about to fall off my invisible pedestal. Okay, I thought. I have to move the powers with me as I walk, like a third leg. Or maybe more like one of those metal walkers with tennis balls on the bottom. No, a plastic baby walker that bounces as you step. Yeah, that’s more like it.

With concentration, I moved slowly, moving my powers with me, and managed to take a step. I looked up. Angela stood there with a hand on her hip and a humored smile.

“Hey,” I said. “Cut me some slack. I’ve only had superpowers for a month. You’ve had them most your life.”

She just kept smiling at me as she extended me her hand. I didn’t take it at first, but eventually I swallowed my pride and clasped hands with her. Immediately I found my balance and stood up straight next to her. We stood there for a moment on the cloud, facing each other, not letting go of each other’s hand.

I looked down at the cloud below us; it was moving in the wind beneath us, like a white river of marshmallows and cotton candy.

“It’s so beautiful,” she said. “I’ve dreamt of this moment my whole life. Standing on the clouds. Flying.”

“This is your wish come true.”

She nodded, smiling brightly.

We held each other’s gaze for a while. The white glow in her pupils seemed to complement her chocolatey brown irises.

A gust of wind blew around us, causing us to wobble. Angela lost balance. I reached for her other hand and pulled her back to her feet, and closer to me.

It was my turn to have the humored grin. “Hey, I thought you said this was just like riding a bike?”

“Yeah, an invisible bike without any training wheels.”

The wind began to die down, making it easier to balance.

I squeezed her hands. “Let’s try something.” I concentrated on my powers, increasing the downward flow a tad, which, in turn, levitated me upward.

Angela was quick to follow, slowly soaring higher with me, both of us grinning. As we flew higher in the air, I redirected my power at an angle, causing us to spin ever so slightly. About the speed of a slow dance.

The view changed as we got higher. We could see the white sea of clouds spread below us. Some large, some small—like little white islands in the distance. The cool wind blew again, threatening to knock us off balance. We pulled each other closer into an embrace, partially to hold each other steady, but mostly just to be close.

We held each other’s gaze for a long moment.

“And this,” she said, “is your wish come true.” She leaned forward and closed her eyes. I did the same. And this time, she didn’t push me away.