Fruits of Insanity

into the unknown

The house was so absolutely quiet that I knew something was up. My children were never this still unless they were up to something, and with their heritage, that could be trouble.

“Angel? Nic?” There was no answer from five-year-old Angelica but I heard a giggle from three-year-old Nicolas. I dropped the laundry and ran out into the backyard.

Nic had smeared garden dirt all over himself as he built a mud castle that was already taller than he was. It was well designed, all things considered. Four towers, a courtyard, and sharp looking crenulations for defenders. I knew it had been a bad idea to let them watch the History Channel. There was even a moat being filled by a stream that started at the corner of the house and continued across the yard. I stood there, shaking my head while he smiled up at me through the dirt.

I wished the kids wouldn’t magic the landscaping. “Nic, that’s Daddy’s garden.”

He giggled and clapped his hands. In an instant, the mud castle sprouted with carrots, snap peas, strawberries, and pumpkin—exactly what Matt had planted.

I closed my eyes. This was going to be a difficult one. “Sweetie, you need to let the seeds grow at their own pace. We can’t eat a year’s worth of produce tonight.” I went over and gave him a hug. “Now, I need you to put Daddy’s garden back the way it was, and we’ll find a different place for your castle.”

He buried his face in my chest and nodded. Together we smoothed the magic away, leaving only the stream and the moat which now ran around the garden—almost like an irrigation ditch. That wasn’t his work.

“Nic? Where’s your sister?”

He looked up at me and babbled a sentence. The only words I understood were: ‘door’ and ‘light’. He pointed towards the wood at the back of the house.

“Okay. Let’s go find her.”

I picked him up and started walking, searching for danger signs. We passed the shed, and the door was open. I peered inside, but a lantern was gone. What would she need with that? And how was she planning to light the thing? I started running.

There was a path through the wood that hadn’t been there before—grass lined and edged by rows of pebbles. I ran as fast as I could without dropping Nicolas, and ahead of us I could see her. She was skipping, not a care in the world, with the lantern swaying in her right hand, already burning. She was nearly at a door, standing red and lonely there in the middle of the wood, a door that shouldn’t be there.

“Angel!”

She stumbled at the sound of my voice, but didn’t turn.

“Stop right there.” I put a command in my voice. I didn’t like to do it, but I didn’t like the look of the door more. She froze, one foot in the air, but she’d be able to shrug off the command in a moment. I hurried up to her and put Nic down.

“What are you doing?” I crouched down, turned her around and took the lantern from her hand. “What’s the rule about strange doors in the middle of nowhere?”

She rolled her eyes and scuffed her toe in the dirt. “Leave them alone. But Mama! I had a light and it’s a friendly door. Just like the one last week.”

I bit my lip to hold back a few choice words and touched her shoulder. “That door was mine. This one isn’t.”

“That’s ‘cause it’s mine, Mama.”

“Angel! Making doors isn’t leaving them alone.” I took a deep breath and made an effort to be calm. Raising a couple of precocious children was a narrow path between letting them experiment with their power and keeping them alive. “What’s on the other side?” It could be anything within the limits of her imagination, and given that she thought it would be dark, I wasn’t going to make any guesses.

She looked at Nic and raised her finger to her lips, then leaned in to whisper, “the wooden shoe that Wynken, Blynken, and Nod go sailing in through the stars. I see it when I sleep, and it’s fun.”

Her favorite bedtime read—it could have been worse. So much worse. “I see.” How to handle this. “Angel, you know you did a wrong thing. You aren’t supposed to have anything to do with doors in the middle of nowhere. I need you to put this door away right now, and we’ll go inside for lunch.”

She looked mutinous, but shrugged and waved the door away. I moved us back into the yard. No way did I want to walk all the way back through the wood. “Thank you, dearest. I promise, after lunch, you can show me how you made it, and we’ll go through together.”

Angelica threw her arms around me and then turned to skip into the house.

word count:835

Prompt 4
the week of August 23

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