“Four days is tons of time!” Parker said mocking his dad’s voice. “Four days have never flown by faster,” he thought. He was lying in his bed, not ready for the day to start. “I at least thought I would get one minute of sleep during the night, but I couldn’t even manage that.”

He rolled over and looked at the clock sitting on his bookshelf. It glowed back, seemingly brighter than ever, 4:48 a.m. “Mom said we have to wake up extra early today so we could get on the road,” he thought.

Slowly, he lifted his head off his pillow and looked out of the window next to his bed. “I never even rearranged the room to get away from the window. It’s like these four days were just wasted. I feel like I got nothing done. I didn’t even find any answers to my questions. It just seems like they were avoiding me so they didn’t have to answer anything.”

A gentle knocking came from the door. Parker’s mother poked her head in, “Dear, are you awake? We need to be heading out shortly.” Parker fell back onto his bed, not ready for this new journey.

He began gathering the remaining things he needed from his room. Trying to cram a couple books in his bag, grab his favorite pillow and put his toothbrush away. As he was leaving his room, he turned around, unsure of when he would be back again.

A gust of wind came in through the window, wrapping itself around Parker. A sense of calm washed over him, “You know what, I’ll be fine!”

When he got to the front door of the house, ready to take his backpack to the car, his dad stopped him. “You can take that stuff in the car if you want, but the only thing you’re allowed to bring with you to the school, are some clothes. So, no books, they’ll have books for you. No toiletries, those will be supplied as well. And you won’t be needing your pillow either.”

Parker’s jaw dropped. “You mean, I can’t have like any of my own stuff with me? What, do they just want me to completely forget about home?” His dad looked at him, with a look that told Parker he still thought that he wasn’t ready to go to this school.

Just before he could say anything, his mom came around the corner. “Oh you’ll be fine dear! After a day, you won’t even notice that you don’t have these things!” His mother seemed so cheery and absolutely positive that Parker was going to love it there.

“Well I’ll just take it back upstairs now so you don’t have to later.” He ran up the stairs to drop his stuff off in his room while his parents were heading out to the car so they were ready to go. As he got close, he felt a strong breeze flowing through the upstairs. When he finally made it to his door, the wind was howling in his room. It felt like there was a tornado blowing around. When he looked in, his books were scattered on the floor, his bed was pushed away from the wall and his mattress was half-off the box spring leaning on the floor.

Standing in the corner, was the figure he’d seen standing out back during the crazy storm. The figure was wearing a black robe that was as dark as the clouds had been the previous day. The type of darkness that drew your gaze in and wouldn’t let go. Parker wanted to scream so his parents could hear, but no sound would come out, like his vocal cords were paralyzed.

The figure just stood there, staring back at Parker but Parker couldn’t make out its face. It was covered in a shadow casted from its hood. Somehow, even though the figure was only five feet away, he could make nothing out, just that there was someone standing in his room.

Parker turned and sprinted out of his room, screaming. Somehow, once he was out of eyesight, he regained his voice. He crashed to the floor after tumbling down the stairs. Bursting out through the front door, yelling for his parents and trying to look back all at the same time. As he made it outside, he tripped over his own feet and went flying into the front yard.

His parents jumped out of the car asking what was going on. “There’s someone in my room! My stuff’s everywhere!” Parker screamed. They looked stunned, and then took off running into the house. Parker didn’t want to go back in just in case the person was still there. But he couldn’t let his parents just go in there by themselves, not with how petrifying that person was.

He made his way up the stairs to his room. As he got closer, it became very uncomfortable. There was no movement in the air. It was so silent you could’ve heard a pin drop from the floor below. When he got to his room, he couldn’t believe what he saw.

Both of his parents were standing in the middle of his room with their backs to the door, just like he had been. “Mom, Dad, are you okay?” he asked.

“No! We are not,” his mother shot back. “You had us terrified that someone broke into the house!”

He looked confused, “What do you mean? There was someone standing right there!” As he pointed to where the figure had been, he noticed that there was absolutely nothing wrong with his room. His books were all exactly where they should be. His bed was right where it was when he woke up that morning. And his backpack, which he had just brought up, lay neatly on the end of his bed.

“I don’t understand… my stuff was everywhere! My books were scattered across the floor,” he said gesturing wildly to where the books had been. “The bed! It was all messed up! The mattress was off and it was pushed away from the wall! I swear! And right there,” he pointed again, “was the figure I was telling you about.”

They looked at him with suspiciously. “Remember how dark the clouds were the other day during that storm? This person had on robes that were just as black. It like captured me and I couldn’t do anything. I tried to yell out for you but I couldn’t even speak. I finally turned and just ran away. And you know what happened next, I crashed into the grass outside.”

His mom was about to speak when his dad cut in, “Look, I understand that you don’t want to go to this school. I know you’re upset that we’re making you go. But that doesn’t mean you have to make up stories to delay leaving. And you scared your mom half to death.” Parker was baffled. They didn’t believe any of it. His dad commented, “Now, thanks to this little stunt, we’re running behind and won’t be able to stop very much on the way.”

Everyone crowded into the car and they took off. “How far of a drive is it to this school dad?”

He looked in the rearview mirror and said, “Well, we were supposed to leave at five a.m. and get there at five p.m., but now that we’re running behind we won’t get there until about five-thirty or six. It’s a long way there, try to get some sleep to pass the time.”

The last thing Parker could do in the car was sleep. Not only can he normally not sleep in the car, but with everything that was happening there was an absolute zero percent chance it was going to happen now.

He closed his eyes, to make his dad at least think he was trying to get some sleep but he just sat there running everything through his head. Everything that had happened the past five days and what was going to be happening for the next, who knows how long.

As he lay in the back seat just listening to his own thoughts, he could hear his sister humming next to him. She was always so happy in her own little world. It seemed like she would just let her long blonde hair dangle in front of her face, letting her escape from whatever was around her.

In the front seat, his parents were talking about everyday things. Then they got really quiet. Parker’s dad glanced in the mirror to see if he had fallen asleep yet. It’d been about a half hour since he closed his eyes so he wondered if his parents were going to start talking about him.

“Look, I know you said you think he’s ready, but I’m just not convinced that he is.” Parker heard every word his dad was saying. “I mean just look at the facts. We have yet to see him wield any fire. His sister is three years younger than him and she already has! Then, he got burned on a doorknob. A doorknob Shelly! How does that even happen in our family? I didn’t think it was possible.”

He heard his mom sigh slightly at what his father was saying. “I know that we haven’t seen anything from him yet Aaron. But I think he’s just a little bit of a late bloomer. And you can’t compare him to Kendall. That’s just not fair. She’s super advanced for her age. We weren’t even able to do what she could at her age.”

Parker kept his eyes closed so that his parents wouldn’t know he was awake. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “What do they mean, ‘wield fire’? How do you wield fire?”

“Look Shelly, I know that being a late bloomer happens, but it’s never happened in this family, ever. That’s why I don’t think Parker is ready to go to the school yet. He needs more time so that…” were the last words Parker heard as he passed out in his seat.