Author’s Note: Happy New Year! I hope everyone had a safe new year. I’ve spent the weekend in Colorado. It’s such a beautiful state. I hope you enjoy! See you next week.
“Rita you’re not alone. You didn’t abandon us wake up!” I hear Robert again.
I am stuck in the fog. Looking around the fog reminds me of that one time I had clam chowder. It is thick and I can feel it surrounding me. I don’t think this is a normal fog. I feel like I’m swimming. “Robert I can’t find you.” I can’t find any of them. I was just surrounded by my family and friends. I would much rather the twisters get us than this.
I am moving through the ever-thickening fog. It is almost as if it was solidifying, forming a substance that is more like cold gravy than fog. “I’m right here sis” I feel his small hand in mine. I look to my side but see nothing, no one, there.
“Rita, I am here” I look up and I see someone who is familiar to me yet I can’t figure out how I know them. He looks a bit like Randy or our dad but I can tell this person is neither of them.
“Who are you?” The fog begins to recede almost as if this person controls it. “Where are we? Where is my family?” I hold my arms up in a fighting stance. I may be weak and I may be the verge of tears because all I ever worry about is the people I love. Family. How strange that word is. Family members are the ones that remain. The ones that stick by my side no matter what. I don’t count my parents or Annabelle as part of my family. Despite myself I still love them but they are no longer family. I shake my head as if that would get rid of my scattered thoughts. “Answer me!”
“I am Robert and what you are seeing is a place in the future. You must take the slower path.” This man must have read a book titled How to Give Vague Answers because that does not make any sense.
“You are Robert? You can’t be Robert is… he’s a lot smaller—”
“I told you this is the future Rita. You have taken your mind to a time where I am a grown man. When you moved the shelter you moved everyone forward in time to after the tornadoes hit the farm. Everyone you were just with is still with you.”
“I can move things… people… in time as well as from place to place? I was just trying to save the little ones.”
“You know very well that Rain and I would not make it without you or Robert. We may not understand our parents and our middle sister right now but we will. It will take time.”
“You mentioned earlier that I must take the slower path. What does that mean?”
“In my time before my power had grown to where I can communicate with you like I am, you moved back and forth through time as soon as you discovered your ability. You wore yourself out. I lost you when we were young. You will find out a lot of things when you wake up. Time travel may be a solution but you must return to your time for extended periods of time or you will burn out. You use up more of your energy that way and it will kill you.”
“That’s why I feel like I do now, isn’t it? Because you said I moved the shelter into the future. Why was everyone asking me if I knew where we moved to?”
“Yes. They have not looked around the land to discover they are on your own land. Take care because more is yet to come.” He raises his hand slowly
“What are you doing?” I back away from this man, who I do NOT believe or trust. “Keep away from me, I don’t know you.”
“I told you I am Robert. I am healing you showing you how to go back into your body into your own time.” He places his hands on my head. His hands are cool to the touch but much too large to be Robert’s.
A flash of light and I begin to feel my Robert’s small cool hands. “Robert …” I mumble in my sleep.
“I’m right here sissy, don’t worry you didn’t abandon us.” His hands are like ice on my forehead, “Randy, I think something’s wrong. She’s too hot.”
“I had to save them.”I can’t control the words that are coming out of my mouth nor the thoughts that run through my head. “They’re my family leave them be.”
“Who is she talking to?” I can hear Rain near me. She’s safe! The impostor didn’t eat her with his fog.
“I’m not sure.” I feel Randy’s rough palm on my forehead. “I think she has a fever.”
“I’ll help her rest.” Robert’s cool hands again. Then sleep.