Flames and Starlight

Ruben and Laura marched Hannah to Laura’s house in silence. Hannah’s pale face was filled with fear as she tightly clutched her backpack to her chest as though it were a shield.

Ruben had caught the last bit of their conversation as he’d approached Laura and Hannah. He’d been on his way to Laura’s house to spend time with her since his uncle had his friends over. When he arrived he saw they were in a heated confrontation and heard Laura demanding to know why Hannah had sketches of them and about the events that were going on in the Eternal World. He’d felt his blood grow cold and wondered what the hell was going on.

His mind was racing as they quickly walked to the house. He had no idea what to make of this situation. In all honesty, with everything that’d been going on with the hooded figure and with Laura’s family drama, he hadn’t thought of Hannah at all. But now that she was here, he realized he always thought something was off with her. Ever since he saw the girl, he knew she was deceptive and thought Peter should’ve never gotten involved with her. Something about her seemed like trouble and it looked like his intuition was right.

They arrived at Laura’s house and ushered Hannah inside.

The second they closed the front door behind them Hannah started. “Guys, I’m so sorry -”

Laura cut her off. “Quiet, I need to make sure the place is empty.”

“Don’t say a word and stay right there,” Ruben instructed sharply and Hannah lowered herself on the couch, appearing like she wanted to disappear.

Ruben and Laura quickly searched the house in case any of her family was home. If they had this conversation with her parents and sister at home then they would interject in the conversation and nothing productive would happen. Damn, but he wished Mark didn’t pick today to have his friends over or they could do it there. Knowing Mark, if he heard their conversation, then he’d interject. Ruben wanted him and Laura to talk to Hannah alone first before deciding on what to do.

Once they saw it was empty, they walked back into the living room and led her to Laura’s room. They locked her door and Hannah sat in Laura’s desk chair as they stood in front of her. He knew they probably looked intimidating as they stared down at her but at the moment, he didn’t care.

“Tell us everything,” Laura demanded.

Hannah took a deep breath. “For the past several months, I kept having visions of you two and Peter. At first, I thought they were dreams but they kept occurring over and over.”

“What kind of visions?” Laura pressed.

“At first, they were just simple visions like us going to the beach, going to dinner together, going to the movies, just like a group of friends and. . .” Hannah’s face turned red and Ruben’s suspicions grew.

“And what?” he pressed.

“I’m just close friends with you two,” Hannah said curtly, clearly uncomfortable.

Despite his being skeptical of the girl, he decided to reign it in. He knew he couldn’t treat her like a criminal and distress her since, even though her having visions of them was weird and alarming, she still hadn’t technically done anything wrong.

He took a deep breath and said, “Sorry, we didn’t mean to come at you so hard.”

“Yeah,” Laura added. “We didn’t mean to turn this into an interrogation. And I didn’t mean to look through your sketchpad the way I did. I honestly didn’t mean to look, it was open and I saw a picture of me and Ruben and wondered what was going on.”

“And with everything that’s been going on in our world, we just want to know what’s going on and it’s put us on edge.”

Hannah seemed to visibly relax. “It’s fine. If I were in your position, I would probably react the same way. I was going to tell you three about the visions and sketches at some point when we got to know each other better.”

Ruben sat down on the edge of Laura’s bed. For some reason, a wave of exhaustion had crashed down on him. His tired mind wondered why things suddenly had to be so complicated.

“So you draw right after you have your visions?” Laura asked.

Hannah nodded. “Yeah. When a vision wakes me up, I quickly draw them so I can remember what happened.”

“How did you get so good at drawing?”

“I’ve been drawing since I was old enough to hold a pencil and I took a lot of art classes.”

Laura gave her a small smile. “You’re really talented.”

“Thanks.”

Ruben rubbed the back of his neck. “I hate to have to ask you to do this, but can you tell us the visions you had of the hooded figure? I know it was probably terrifying, but Laura and I saw it in front of us and it’s probably what’s causing all of this.”

Hannah tensed up and Ruben felt slightly guilty for bringing it up but they had to know what she saw.

For a second, he thought she was going to refuse but she took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a second as though she was mentally preparing herself. “In my vision, I was walking down an empty street and dead shapeshifters fell from the sky. I ran into a store that was also empty and then the hooded figure appeared. He told me that if I wanted to save everyone I cared about, then I had to go back to the human world.”

An uneasy silence filled the room as the three of them didn’t know what to do or say next. Now that all the cards were out on the table, they had to come up with a game plan on what to do next.

“What now?” Hannah asked into the silence.

Ruben and Laura exchanged a glance and through that one look, they made a plan. They knew each other well enough to guess what the other was thinking.

“We need to see a Guardian about this,” said Laura.

“Definitely,” Ruben agreed.

Hannah frowned. “Would they believe us?”

“They should,” Ruben said. “They want any possible leads they can get about what’s going on and this could be beneficial to them.”

The door burst open, cutting off what Hannah was about to say. Alison stormed in, wearing her usual scowl and Ruben’s mood instantly soured.

“What are you doing?” Alison snapped and glared at them as though they’d called her every name in the book.

“None of your business,” Laura said calmly and the three of them walked out of the room.

Alison followed them and Ruben gritted his teeth, trying to hold back the urge to tell the bitch to get lost.

“I need to talk to you,” Alison practically snarled and Ruben’s hands clenched into fists. Geez, what was her problem? If she wasn’t the love of his life’s sister. . . “Tell your boyfriend and this girl to leave.”

“It’s going to have to wait,” Laura said and didn’t even glance in her sister’s direction as she opened the front door and they walked outside.

As they walked away, Ruben could hear Alison fuming and muttering under her breath before slamming the door behind them.