Just Another Day at the Office

by Amber Lynn

We made it back to the house within five minutes. Before I headed to the kitchen, I decided to splash some water on my face and wash up in the bathroom. I didn't know why I felt a bit grimy, but the fact remained that I did and I wanted to do something about it. Feeling better after a little soap and water, I wandered into the kitchen to decide on dinner.

  "Are you craving anything in particular?" I asked Nate. It seemed I did that a lot, and at some point I was going to make something and expect him to eat without any input.

  "That would depend on how much work you want to do. I'd love some of your homemade tortellini with a sauce of your choice, but that takes a while and you don't have your pasta rollers here," he replied from the living room.

  There were times when we shared the kitchen, but I still enjoyed having it as my domain. Nate understood that and after recent revelations, I assumed he'd garnered it straight from my mind.

  "I can do that. We have the ingredients and it won't be that bad. I'll have to go old school and use a rolling pin. Since it was your idea you have to help shape the pasta, though." If I was going to get messy, he didn't get to sit around watching the news, or whatever it was he'd tuned in to.

  I grabbed a large bowl, the flour and a couple eggs. I poured some flour into the bowl and added the eggs. I was never big on measuring when it came to making pasta. I'd learned the general ratio of ingredients over many years of practice.

  As I mixed, I walked over to the sink and turned on the water. My mixture was just a little on the dry side, so I added just a couple of splashes of the water to get it to the right consistency.

  With the dough made, I took some more flour and generously floured the counter. After hunting around a little for the rolling pin, I went to work rolling out the dough to the point it was see through. When I achieved perfection, I cut the dough into two-inch squares.

  "Okay, we're ready to fill. Get the garden veggie cream cheese out of the fridge and start spooning little dollops in the center of each pasta square. I need to get the water boiling," I directed as I rinsed the flour from my hands and set to work filling a pot with water.

  Nate had stood watching in fascination as I worked. He did that a lot and I wasn't sure why. I assumed it had to do with past lives we'd shared, or something else I wasn't prepared to know about.

  After I placed the pot over the heat, I returned to the counter to check on Nate's progress. He was about halfway done with the cream cheese, so I decided to get a sauce made up. Butter, milk, Parmesan cheese, a dried soup mix and a mess of garlic powder combined into a saucepan over medium heat.

  ?While it did its thing, I prepared to fold the pasta. Filling a small bowl with water, to act as my glue, I moved back to instruct Nate. He'd heard the instructions before, but had proven to fail miserably when it came to carrying them out. I didn't think speaking to him slowly would really help, but it made me laugh as I did.

  "Okay, here is what you do. Take one of the squares, dip your finger in the water and moisten the edges of the pasta. Then take it and fold it in half to make a triangle, pressing the edges together firmly. Once you have your triangle, all you have to do is connect the bottom two points with a little water glue and you have a tortellini." I showed off my finished product. Nate's face told me he wasn't amused by my tone.

  I shrugged my shoulders and went to work. It didn't take long to get through the rest of the pasta and Nate's additions looked mostly normal. I threw them in the boiling water. Checking on the sauce, I saw it had come together nicely, so I turned it down to low and waited for the pasta to cook. The nice thing about fresh pasta was it only took a few minutes. When each little tortellini floated to the surface, I strained the water off and added them to the sauce.

  "If you grab the plates, we can eat," I told Nate.?He didn't waste any time following orders.

  As we sat down to eat, he brought up my long-distance phone call. "So, you were able to contact Rick telepathically over a distance of about two thousand miles, and you did it with relative ease."

  "Yup." The question was rhetorical, so I didn't think I needed to say anything else. I could've gotten technical about me being able to send, but Rick couldn't return messages, but there was no need.

  "I've never heard of someone being able to do that. Ten miles is usually a stretch for most," he said as he studied me. Like just looking at me was going to magically explain why I was able to do it.

  "Maybe it has to do with my extended break in between lives. I might have needed the time to cook up some new magic powers."

  "I have no doubt it has something to do with that, since you've never been able to do it before. My question would be why it happened?"

  Having no answer to that question, I ate my meal while he thought about it. It seemed important for him to figure out what was going on with me. From my point of view, there was too much going on to even start trying to make sense of things.

  Getting bored by the silence, I asked, "So, since we exist, are there other things out there like in the books and movies?" I wasn't sure which species to ask about first. I imagined shape-shifting was more than likely possible in other forms.

  "Of course. We've even run into a couple since we've been together. There are so many different varieties of nonhumans that I don't want to sit here and list them all, but the next time we see one when we are out and about, I'll tell you."

  "Cool. Are we going to call Rick, so you two can worry about what's going on together?" I asked, wondering where my phone had gotten to.

  I remembered that I'd left it on the kitchen counter and was feeling too lazy to get up. I hadn't been told how to move objects, but I didn't imagine it could be very hard. I faced the kitchen to start concentrating on my phone and pictured it moving from the kitchen to me. Soon enough, I saw my phone floating in the air coming towards me. I wasn't sure if I was more surprised by the accomplishment or if Nate was.

  "Avery, please tell me you're not moving that phone," Nate said, and he took the win for most surprised. When it came down to it, I thought it was cool more than anything else.

  "Okay, I'm not moving it. It decided to walk out here all on its own." The phone was close enough to me that I reached out and wrapped my fingers around it.

  "Please dial Rick and put him on speaker phone. We have a lot to discuss."

  I did as instructed and Rick picked up on the third ring. For expecting a call from us, he took his time answering.

  "Hey, baby girl, I thought I'd hear from you sooner," he said as a greeting.

  "Hey, Freddie, sorry, had to deal with an emotional robot at work. He caused me to run behind. Oh and if you couldn't tell, it was requested this call be on speaker phone."

  "Rick, we seem to have a little bit of a developing issue here." Nate had issues blowing things out of proportion and it sounded like he was at it again.

  "You mean more than the amplified telepathy?" Rick asked.

  "Add amplified telekinesis to that and I think it's just a tad bit more," Nate said edgily.

  "It was nothing. I just moved the phone from the other room," I said, defending myself. Nate made it sound like I'd preformed a miracle and brought someone back to life.

  "You did what?" Rick semi-screeched.

  "What's the big deal? I saw Nate move a can the other day." I'd thought it was a general ability we all shared.

  "How far did she move the phone?" Rick asked.

  "I'm not exactly sure the path it took, since it was behind a wall, but I would have to say a good fifty feet."

  "Seriously? That's really impressive Avery," Rick said and I almost expected him to clap for me.

  "I hadn't taught her how to move objects yet. She asked if we should call you, and then evidently decided she didn't want to get up, so she brought the phone to her."

  "I am in the room still guys and I'm trying to figure out what the big deal is. Nothing you've said has sounded like a big deal to me." They were peeving me off a little as they continued their chat.

  Nate stared at
me. "The big deal is the fact that I've never seen one of us move an object that far or when they couldn't see the thing they were moving. Across a small room is the usual limitation for the few of us that have the ability. I know I mentioned we had all these amazing abilities, but they only go so far, and from what I've seen, you've jumped over the usual limits without even breaking a sweat."

  "So, it's just like the other stuff. My extra time away must have just amplified things. No big deal." They were real mood killers. I thought it was an awesome thing to move my phone.

  "My worry is that you may have new abilities that we haven't seen before," Rick said, and I watched Nate nod in agreement.

  "Are you worried that if I have all these abilities, I won't need you as a protector anymore?" I teased Rick, trying to lighten things up a little.

  "Believe me, I've been around you for the last three months, you'll always need a protector, Avery."

  "You just caught me at a bad time in my life. Before Nate came around, I never had any issues."

  It was the truth and I used to resent Nate for turning my life upside down, but I knew if he hadn't come around, chances were it'd be a while before I could do what I decided would be my next trick.

  I mentally picked up the fork from my plate and threw it across the room so it embedded in the wall. The new trick was sure to come in handy if I had to fight someone with my hands tied behind my back.

  "Avery, don't do that," Nate scolded me, earning him the treat of seeing my tongue stuck out at him.

  "What's she doing now?" Rick sounded excited to know, but at the same time a little scared.

  Since they are being so moody, I thought of Rick and projected what I'd done to him.

  "Okay, remove all the sharp objects from the house now, Nate."

  "Don't tell me she told you already." Nate wasn't happy.

  "Even better, she sent it to me in Technicolor, poor wall."

  "Avery, you need to slow down a little," Nate suggested. "I think whatever has triggered your memories is also triggering these talents. You couldn't move objects around before by just thinking of them, could you?"

  "Well, no, and like every little kid you know, I tried. Maybe I'm coming back online from just being around other phoenixes so much."

  "You lived with your parents for years and last time I checked they're phoenixes too," Rick said. "I'm still not sure how they kept you from us. Nate might not have been around, but I was."

  My parents had kept it from me, so if anyone got to be offended I thought I won that award.

  "True, but I'm pretty sure they're evil devil phoenixes. At least my mom is. I forgot to tell you, Rick, our cover is blown thanks to her."

  "What did she do this time?" Rick asked, like he was well aware of her meddling ways. I imagined he knew even better than I did, since he had longer memories of her.

  "She posted vacation pics of me and Nate on her Facebook page. My AI robot found it and started calling me Avery today." That reminded me, "Mom, take down any Facebook pictures you have of me and Nate now. They're blowing our cover," I thought to her.

  The best use of telekinesis had to be talking to my mother without the fear of listening to her response. I could tell her what to do, but unless I decided to pick up the phone when she called, she couldn't talk back.

  Nate's cell phone started ringing. I immediately said, "Don't answer that. Just let her stew awhile. You know, I think it's funny she's learned to call your phone if she wants to talk to me."

  "What did you do?" Nate asked as he looked down and confirmed who was on the other end.

  "Nothing. I just told her to take down the pictures. It was an important thing to communicate, so I wasn't even abusing my power. You go from being an ordinary girl to having the ability to do what I've done today and see how you handle it. I'm sure the novelty will wear off soon, but for now, let me have my fun, okay?"

  Nate got up and walked over to me, putting his hand on my cheek. "As long as you let us know the second you feel something different going on. Previously, you could also see the future and had a bit of touch clairvoyance. When those come online, if they are as strong as your current abilities are displaying, you may run into trouble."

  "Yeah, the touch thing used to be a rare glimpse you got every once in a while. If it manifests strongly, you may not be able to touch anything without getting flashes of the past," Rick added.

  "Okay, I understand. It isn't like I asked for these supercharged abilities. I think I'm using a ton of restraint. There isn't anything in the house that's currently floating around is there?" I asked.

  "There may not be anything in your house, but for some reason I just started floating over here." Rick sounded a little more at ease, which was funny considering what I'd done.

  "Oops. Sorry, I didn't think it would actually work," I apologized and thought of Rick with his two feet on the ground.

  "No problem, just warn a guy next time you want to do an experiment."

  "She really picked you up from this far away?" Nate asked, clearly not ready to accept things.

  "I didn't get very far off the ground or anything. Only like a foot, but yes I was just levitating."

  "Part of me worries about how strong these abilities are, but another is really relieved. If you ever get kidnapped again or someone pulls a gun on you, I don't have to worry about your safety as much." He leaned down and kissed my forehead.

  "So are we done with this little meeting of the minds? I'm getting tired and I have a busy day of pleading a robot's case tomorrow."

  "I think we're good for now. We'll let you know if anything comes up, Rick," Nate said, grabbing the phone.

  "Talk to you guys later. Goodnight, baby girl."

  "Night," I yelled back.

  Nate hung up the phone and we headed to the bedroom. After we changed into our sleeping clothes and got tucked in, Nate gave me my nightly kiss on the forehead and said, "Avery, I love you very much, not just the person I remember, but who you are now, and all of this is starting to scare me."

  "I know you do and I know it's different, but I really don't think you need to be scared. I promise to use extreme caution when using my mind for the abilities that are online now and anything that comes." I gave him a small kiss on the cheek to try to give him a little reassurance.

  "Coming from you, I guess extreme caution will be the best I can get, although your definition varies greatly from mine."

  We both laughed. It was a little sad that he spoke the truth. Within minutes, I was fast asleep and any worries would wait until I woke up.

  CHAPTER 20

  Don't quit your day job