Goodbye Normal (8 page)

“Oh my god” she flinched backwards.

Everything she was holding dangled to the ground. Her phrenetic eyes gazed at the chain on her neck. It was not a dream after all. It was as real as the mirror she was gazing at.

“Oh noo…Oh no oh no.” she rambled a cry.

“Zoe” Liz’s cranky voice called out for her. She closed her mouth with her palm. Her ramble and the rattling noise must have woken her.

She heard movements and realized Liz was coming to her. She looked down at the chain and pondered whether she should remove it or not, but decided against removing. She wanted to witness for herself whether Liz will be able to see it or not.

Zoe held the chain as Liz walked inside the bathroom.

“Hey are you okay, I thought I heard some noises.” Liz said with a foggy voice and a concerned look.

She closed the distance between them and followed Zoe’s gaze.

“What are you looking at, did you hurt your hand or something?” she asked while holding Zoe’s hand closer to her eyes.

Zoe looked at her franticly, Liz creased with confusion.

“Are you okay, you don’t look good.”

Zoe shook her head from the obvious frightening evidence.

“Am…ah fine I just tripped, must be the hangover.” she lied, pulling her palm softly out of Liz’s grip.

Liz laughed lazily “look at your face, you look like you’ve seen a ghost. God I feel so sleepy, it’s as if I slept for a minute. By the way what time is it?” Liz asked while walking back to the bedroom.

“Liz” Zoe called after her. She wanted to ask if she remembered having any strange dream. But when she turned to listen she was certain she had not, or else she would have already told her.

“Goodnight.”

“Aren’t you coming to bed, its five o’clock.” Liz asked throwing an eye at her bed side clock.

“I’ll be with you in a sec, want to go down for some milk.” she said.

“Okay, see yah in the morning, aah no… see yah later.” She chortled and threw herself on the bed.

Zoe went to the cabinet for another pill, this time drinking it with four full cups of water. She washed her face and left it damp. Threw the fallen pill into the trash can, switched off the lights then closed the door. All these little things were done with caution to avoid the mirror.

Right after grabbing her phone from under the pillow, she went for the door and closed it soundlessly behind her. Her feet walked through the hall way to the stairs.

She sat midway through the stairway, weary and hopeless. Not wanting to go to bed. She already had enough on her plate and adding guilt wouldn’t do her any good. Guilt was what she felt when she looked at Liz and was unable to tell her what was happening to her. Her eyes roamed around the room and ceased at a window.

 It was a quarter to six but the sun had not yet risen. She watched as a civil dawn greeted the big white house. It was still dark and too quiet. She didn’t want to think of her cryptic future, it was too much for her to handle. Her life was turned upside down overnight. Why her, there was nothing distinctive about her, not enough to be picked by that cauldron. Angry sobs roared out of her, she couldn’t control the streaming tears. Every tear that dropped held desperation, confusion and a question.

She needed to talk to someone, a friend, boyfriend, family… anyone.

But surely there was really no one.

Zoe glowered at her phone while scrolling through her phone contacts. She blew out a heavy sigh, her face was jade as she stared at Chris’s contact. They had a five hours difference from where he was, but they hadn’t talked in a long time. She thought to herself, although they’d ended their relationship without throwing fits, it would still be awkward if she called him.

She could almost imagine how the conversation would go.

“Hey”

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Cool, how is it going in L.A.”

“Fine, what is going on Zoe, we haven’t talked in like forever.”

“I called to tell you am a witch.”

“You missed me that much huh, did you fly out here with a broom or something”

He’d probably laugh at his own quip. She envisaged that, smiling to her speculation and wiping away sad tears. Everyone she’d tell may probably think it’s a stupid joke. Thinking about it, she had not believed it herself, so how would they.

Liz would definitely go nuts by hypothesis of her real dream, or whatever that was. Her mother hated witchcraft so much that she may end up taking on some new demented hobby. And lucky or unlucky her, she had no boyfriend. Literally her social life was practically empty.
I need some new pack of friends,
she decided and another small doleful smile crawled up on her face.

The past hours had been few but relatively powerful enough to change her life forever.

With just one decision, her life was bound to change for the undefined.

Zoe suddenly felt famished, her stomach insisting with a grumble. She dragged her feet to the refrigerator and pulled out a can of milk and was in luck to find some cookies. Liz’s favorite. Liz would throw a fit if she found out, but at that particular moment she was too hungry to care.

Zoe’s face was crestfallen as she stood on the marble kitchen heating the milk in the microwave. She busied her mind with the same fashion magazine she had been skimming through the previous afternoon. When the microwave alarm rung, she grabbed her hot mug and sat on the kitchen table guttling the cookies.

After stuffing her stomach with milk and cookies, she felt an urge to get comfortable. The custom made couch was inviting. If not a friend then a couch would do, the thought brought a smile to her misery. She shifted from the kitchen to the seating room and perched her bleak self to the couch. Her cozy snuggle transmuted her fatigue mind to a sleepy head.

She had dreamless three hours sleep.

A warm prod brought her back to the life she was not content with just yet. She rubbed her eyes as she looked at the lovely never aging Margaret Donaldson. Mrs. Donaldson was a blonde. Her green eyes were watching her intently and her brows were pulled together with worry. She had a black beautiful dress on, something Zoe figured must have been the last night outfit.   

“Zoe dear are you okay? Why are you sleeping on the couch?” she asked

“Nooo… no it’s fine. I just passed out from drinking milk.” she chuckled and collected herself from the couch.

“Oh my God you got me so worried, I was beginning to imagine you had a fight with Lisbeth and she made you sleep there.”

“Oh no, It’s nothing like that.” She assured with a smile.

“Thank Goodness. I just got in and it looked pretty strange. Well, let me go freshen up and I will come down to catch up and make coffee” she sounded delightful.

“No thank you, and well am glad you woke me, I have to get home very early. If you don’t mind could you please let Liz know am gone when she wakes up. I just have a couple of errands I -” she replied a little too desperately.

“Sure, Are you sure you are okay” she disrupted her, noticing her uneasiness.

“Uhhuh” she replied calmly, not sure if she was really okay.

Zoe followed her with her eyes as she ascended the stairs, cursing her restlessness in the process. She then followed her lead to Liz’s room. Inside it, she found Liz dead asleep. Without wasting time, she grabbed her keys and purse then fled.

She plugged her iphone to the car radio and played it loud enough with intentions of not hearing her thoughts.

She arrived home, and parked her car but couldn’t come out of it. She stared past the house frame trying to plan a strategy. If she got out of the car she had to know what she would go about to keep her mouth shut: And how she would do it for the mean time. It would be tough to hide things from Carol, other than Liz she had always been a great confidant. She had gotten used to saying little white lies. But the kind of lie she was keeping now was eating her up. She tried comforting her conscious by telling herself that she was not lying but keeping a secret life she had not yet come to terms with.

It may come a time that she will be ready to tell them. To explain and answer all the questions she could not answer them at that moment. Questions she could barely answer herself.

Zoe dabbed her head on the sterling wheel purposely after a thought brought a red light into her mind. The biggest problem she was yet to solve, was finding out if she was what they thought she was. If she was gifted or ungifted, a weary smile formed on her lips for the way they neutralized the real uneasy scary words to casual bearable syllables.

She sat upright on her driver’s seat, with her chin lifted and her eyes closed. She breathed in as long as she could and then opened her car door ready for an adventurous secret life.

“Wow you really look
Good
in it.” Carol called out interrupting her thoughts.

She turned to see her mother standing on the foyer, grinning at her with an apron and cooking glove on her hands. Zack came out of nowhere and raced straight to the car.

“Morning guys.” she greeted.

Carol smiled “Morning darling.”

“It is a good morning.” Zack replied from behind her.

“It’s cool hah.” she told Zack rather than the intended question it was supposed to be.

“Kinda.” he said, inspecting the ride thoroughly.

“Really, that’s all you got. I won’t do you any favors with it.” she kidded.

Zack’s eyes didn’t leave the car “You are incapable of mean.” he said.

“Oh really, I will gladly prove you wrong.” she replied 

“You’ll teach me how to drive though?” he bamboozled.

“Sure no worries.” she smiled, and bought the prank.

“You see, told yah.” he jeered.

“Get out of here, before I strangle you.” she faked anger while watching him walk back into the house with a victorious shrug.

When Zack was out of the picture, she was left with her mother by the foyer.

“What were you cooking” she asked loving and extending the distraction she was getting from here unwanted thoughts.

“Baking cookies, Is everything okay honey, you looked distracted.”

She genuinely smiled at the idea of cookies, but when the subject was suddenly changed, so did her smile.

“Am fine mom.” she faked a smile.

“You can tell me darling. I’m your mother and I saw the look you had in your car and it didn’t look good Zoe.”

“Really mom, am just tired, It’s all good.” she insisted, hating on the nag.

“I don’t believe you, I know what I saw dear, did you argue with Liz-”

“Really mom I’m okay, quit it will you.” she snapped then bolted to the door.

Carol stared at her back with disbelief. She shrugged her shoulders and went back inside warily.

Zoe opened her door and hated how she snapped but her guilt was acting up. It was either that or her mother’s nagging would have caused her the bitter truth. A revelation that was not safe for either of them to ponder at the moment. The other possibility that could occur was for her to vent her frustrations on Carol. She slammed her bedroom door and locked it behind her.

A groan escaped her throat at the sight of Josh on her wall. She made an instant note in her mind to bury her anger on tearing the poster apart.

Her raged hands saw to it that the poster was torn to incredibly small pieces, one could almost refer the end result to a machinery work. With all the pulverized pieces on her bed, she took joy in taking pictures of her mosaic.

Zoe looked around her room and adjudicated that she needed some more distraction. The activities that shot up in her mind were cleaning her room, taking a shower, doing her nails and then later on help Carol in the kitchen.

Her routine begun from the laundry room. She took a broom, a cobweb brush and other cleaning facilities. When she passed the kitchen to her room Carol eyed her suspiciously.

Zoe could feel her gaze all over her back but she wasn’t about to start any dialogue that would obviously lead to a guilt trip. She let her drown in her multiple assumptions or whatever conclusion she was drawing in her head as she played cleaning.

She strolled to her room, locked her door and played some loud music to keep her away from mentations. She walked to the mirror and removed her amulet carefully then placed it on her dresser. 

Just before she could let her dubious self start obsessing over her fate, she grabbed her broom and started dancing to the ear blocking music. She swept her messes, changed her sheets and covers to dull pink ones and did some rearrangement.

That afternoon Zoe stood in the shower longer than usual, straining not to think of her alien world but shifting her thoughts to a new project, taking random pictures. A to do she assigned for the next day.

Feeling fresh and covered up with a t-shirt and shorts she walked to the kitchen clouded with a maze of picture taking scenarios.

If someone stayed at their home for a weekend, she or he would be insane not to think her mother was once upon a time chef. It was as if she could not leave the kitchen.

She looked at the cookie jar, it was a quarter fool. That was not right.

“Mom, weren’t you baking cookies this morning?”

“I was,” she gave her a second’s glace then to the jar “oh you wondering how fast they are gone? It’s all your brother’s doing, he has gone to meet some friends and I think they are having a bakery party of some sort.”

“A bakery party mom, really?” do eight yr old boys have bakery party’s? Did she wake up in another century?

“Why else would he go running with half the jar? I told him next weekend I will teach him how to bake so that he would start entertaining his friends on his own expense.”

Zoe chuckled “good luck with that” she said biting a cookie.

“He begged me yesterday to bake cookies. He then told me that he and his friends are going battle on video games and everyone was to bring some baked snacks.” she defended.

“So you decided to name it bakery party for him.” Zoe probed, walking to the sink.

“Am glad he’s not around to hear that.” Carol confessed looking very relieved.

“Do you need any help with that?” Zoe asked looking at the elbow macaroni Carol was about to boil while she helped rinsing dishes on the sink.