Head between her knees, she wept alone in the living room of an empty home.
Her cries got louder as she looked at the screen of her phone in her hands, her eyes and face red. Sarah looked like she had been crying for hours.
She pulled herself up from the carpet that she had been sitting on, and wiped her tears, harshly rubbing her face. She looked at her disheveled self in the glass of a book rack; her messy, dirty blond hair, and the bra strap that was falling off her shoulder under the sleeveless top.
She wiped her wet hands on her sweatpants and dialed her phone.
"He's gone!"
"Jaden!''
"I've checked everywhere. He's not here."
Sarah started tearing her nails with her teeth while explaining to the other person on the phone.
"What do you mean?"
His chest and belly exposed, with only silk pajamas and a robe covering his body, David rushed with questions as soon as he Jumped to his sister's house.
"Where is he?
He jumped again, not letting his sister explain.
"Jaden!"
David called his nephew, repeating his name. He bent down to check under the bed and opened the 5-year-old's closet.
He Jumps every corner of the house, unsatisfied.
"What happened?" He finally got back to his sister and asked her, all furious.
"I don't know, okay, I woke and went to his room, he wasn't there, I've looked around the house." Sarah tried explaining to her brother.
"Wait, what time was it then?"
"Around 8." She hesitated while answering.
David paused and stared at his sister as she sounded unreliable.
"Sarah, it's almost 11 am. Why didn't you say anything earlier?"
"I...." She started sobbing.
David gritted his teeth and closed his eyes. He turned his head around, trying not to lash out at the person standing in front of him.
He rubbed his face and mouth with his palms trying to calm himself.
"Okay!" David changes his tone, trying not to agitate his sister more.
'When I was the last time you saw him."
"Last night, after his dad dropped him off." Sarah, answered almost choking on her saliva,
"What time was it?"
" 7."
"And then what?"
"I...I gave him ice cream 'cause he wanted some, and watched his favorite show, I bathed him and put him to bed." Sarah stuttered trying to clarify.
David looked at his sister; unconvinced.
"I don't know what more you want me to say. I'm his mom! I take care of him like I always have. I didn't go anywhere leaving him alone at home. I'm not seeing anybody." She broke down again.
"Okay! And you haven't said anything to his father?
She nodded.
''What about mom?"
Sarah exasperatedly answered.
"No. Not yet."
"Okay! Okay, good. The security cams that I made you install, they are still functioning? I'm gonna check those, we are gonna find him, Sarah, but we need to be quick, and we are going to need help."
~~~~~~~
Rayla flung the door open as she came in and slammed it shut behind her.
"I'm here. Where is he? Is he okay?" She bombarded her sibling with questions.
"We don't know, yet. But he will be fine." David answered.
"What are you doing?" Rayla asked her brother.
"Checking the home security cams."
"And? She glared at her elder siblings as one of them sat leisurely with a PC on his lap, and the other was frozen on the other end of the sunken sofa, unable to even react.
"Okay. Good. But maybe you should call one of your people who are good at these things, those twins or whatever." She suggested as she was displeased with her siblings' lack of urgency.
"You okay?" Rayla asked her sister, who looked disordered and weak.
"Fine," Sarah gave a dubious answer.
''l'm gonna go upstairs and see if I can find something."
Rayla closed the door behind her as soon as she entered her nephew's room. She looked at her shaky arms and shook them, letting them stop. She wiped her sweaty palms on the edge of her oversized tee revealing her shorts.
She sat on the bed and let out a sigh. Trying to process everything that was happening.
"Okay, Jaden. Where are you?
She brushed her fingers around his toy, pulled his blanket closer, and lay down on the kid's bed. Rayla brought her nephew's blanket to her face.
She closed her eyes.
Her eyelids twitched as she went into a trance. Her body jittered, making her head turn in convulsions for a bit, and a few minutes later, she jolted back up into a sitting position.
Her eyes gently open. Rayla stared in a daze.
"David!!!" She yelled for her brother.
"What! David stood in front of her sister in worry.
"He disappeared."
"Okay. You people need to start being more clear with your words. What does that mean?"
''I swear, he was just here, under these.'' She pulled and tucked the blanket.
"I like he was." She paused.
"Like, What?" David questioned, already losing patience with his sisters.
"Scared. He was scared of something. That was on the other side of this door." Rayla got up, trying to clarify.
"What?"
"He was shaking, I could hear him breathing under his blankets and a freaking dinosaur toy he was hugging."
"We need to ask Sarah."
"Wait, something is not right here." She walked up closer to her brother, who was standing near a closed door.
"What do you mean?"
Rayla paused
"Did you get on the bed?" She lowered her voice while speaking.
"This bed. No. Why?"
"The frequency is there."
"Frequency of what? What are you talking about?"
"Frequency of the path taken to go elsewhere." She raised her brows as she explained.
"Frequency to go else-. You mean like Jumping, and why are you talking like that?"
"You want me to help, or not?"
"Okay!"
The youngest and the eldest gave each other looks of contempt.
"Okay! So, someone's energy is saturated here, I don't know what or who, but it's there. The frequency is not strong anymore, but it looks like somebody used this place as their portal to either leave or get here. Now the question is."
"Whether he Jumped himself or somebody came and took him." David sat down in a tiny chair in exhaustion.
"Yes." Rayla sat back down on the bed.
David shook his legs and bit his dry lips as he hung his head down in distress.
"Okay, you said that the frequency is still saturated here."
"For now, I guess."
"Okay! You need to find that frequency and redirect it towards me. Can you do that?"
"Why?"
"I'm going to follow it."
"Wait, you can do that. Besides, we are not even sure if it's a Jumper. Also, you could get in danger. What if it's a different country? Illegal teleportation could get you arrested."
"We'll have to try, Rayla. Every minute we spend here, Jaden is at risk, and I'm the best and fastest chance to bring him back home safely."
"Fine! I'll do it." She gulped nervously.
She hesitated and paused.
"Go that side." Rayla tapped on the bed, calling her brother to sit.
"Now give me your hand," She shuddered and cleared her face.
She blew out air from her lips and looked at her brother.
"Every Jumper leaves a mark. But if you're like me, my marks disappear within seconds, considering the mark left here, I'm willing to bet it's an amateur, nothing I couldn't handle." He tried comforting his little sister.
"Did you feel anything? Yet."
"Nope"
"Okay, here we go."
----
"Holy, fuck!" David chuckled as he found himself looking at the crowd of children and their parents; some getting dragged by their hands and others being held in arms.
"Okay. Where are you, buddy?"
"David rushed through a children's theme park, looking around, going from one corner to the other.
-----
Rayla walked back and forth between the rooms and the stairs. She fidgeted in fear as she couldn't tell whether she had sent her brother to find their nephew, or to his imminent death.
"Where's David?" Sarah asked her little sister, standing at the foot of the stairs, looking weak.
"Went to find Jaden," Rayla sounded unsure about the last part.
"Hmm," You want something to eat? I can make you something." She tried to help her little sister, who was visibly scared.
"Who was it?" Rayla abruptly asked her sister.
"What?"
"The one who gave you the spell."
''I don't know what you're talking about."
"Who gave it to you, Sarah?" You scared him."
"Where have you put it now?"
"Is it still in the house?
"I don't have to tell you anything," Sarah said strenuously.
"You what, I'm going to find it myself." She ran down the stairs in determination.
"You will do such a thing."
"Do you even know what you have done? Do you even understand the intensity of the spell that you used and the consequences of it?"
"Consequences!"
"Yes! You are not a Witch; it's forbidden for you to use spells without proper guidance from a practicing Witch."
"Four months ago, you didn't wanna come home. And now is that how you're going to treat me?" Sarah's back to her sister; she gripped the railing of the stairs, her voice shaky, and one couldn't tell her demeanor.
Rayla paused, realizing she might have gone too far.
"I'm gonna have to tell Mom and David. It's for Jaden, Sarah!"
"You are not going to do anything." Sarah struggled with every word she spoke and staggered as she turned to look at her sister.
Rayla took a step back, her eyes widened as she saw her sister's expression.
She couldn't recognize someone whom she had spent half of her life with.
Her body froze, as she was unable to react to the person in front of her, whose face did not belong to her elder sister.
"Get out!" She screamed, her voice distorted, and her eyes bulged open, and the pupils inside were split into multiple sets of pupils covering the entire white of her eyes.
The darkened, veiny scars that came out from the corners of her mouth and eyes stretched to her temples and her ears.
The wooden floor creaked as her feet hovered a few inches off the ground.
Her mouth now fully open, Rayla was finally able to let out a scream and ran off.
*********