Cassy grabbed some grocery bags and began putting the new jug of milk into the fridge. A dim ceiling light gave the room an orange hue that blended into the darkness of the living room. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Rose across the kitchen placing boxes in the pantry. The woman's curled short hair bounced slightly as she leaned and picked up a bag. Cassy, then, looked down.
"I know we're moving. That's what you wanted to talk to me about, isn't it?" She said passively, looking at the handle of the refrigerator.
"...Yes." Rose stiffened, waiting for the backlash.
"Why?" The uneasiness returned in Cassy's stomach. 'Why'? Rose pondered. That's it? She didn't expect this. Of all the scenarios that ran through Rose's head up until this very moment, none of them were like this. Rose expected at least some sort of resistance to bring the teenage proclivity justice. Still confused, she replied to her granddaughter's question.
"I got a better job offer in Delaware. It was a bit of a last minute thing." She peered slightly behind herself in the case of a reaction.
"But you told me you already accepted the one here??" Cassy whipped around. She stared at her grandmother, hunched slightly over the counter, with disorientation.
"It ...didn't work out." Rose could barely look the girl in the eyes. "Plus this new one has much better pay and you know we need the money." Cassy couldn't believe what she was hearing. 'Didn't work out'? Several weeks ago, we talked about how you got that real estate job in the bag. What could've changed? She thought. They stood in tense silence for a moment. Lost in her thoughts, Cassy suddenly realized that she needed to answer. Another thought came to the front of her mind.
"What about Wyatt?" Cassy traced some stray hair over and around her ear.
"Sparks?" Rose tilted her head slightly. "What about him?" She was baffled. How could she be thinking about him at a time like this? Shouldn't she be asking about what's going to happen to her? Rose was once again surprised. She sighed. She is only a teenager though.
"It's been a hard year for him, Grandma." Cassy reflected. "I can't just leave."
"You're a good friend, Cassilia." Rose smiled faintly. "But you can't always be there for him." Cassy held a sour face. She didn't know why that bothered her. Of course she couldn't always be there, but she still wanted to. Cassy moved to leave the kitchen when she remembered something else.
"Is it ok if Wyatt stays for the night? He got into an argument with his parents again..." She twiddled her thumbs absent-mindedly.
"Sure, dear." Rose sighed. "...He can't keep pushing them away forever, though." Cassy nodded as she slowly walked through the doorway. Rose's composure gave way as soon as Cassy left the room. The guilt built up over the course of a month began to overwhelmingly spill out. Rose couldn't stop the tears as they flowed down her cheeks.
Cassy grabbed a blanket from the linen closet in the living room and ran into Wyatt on her route to the guest room. He wore a familiar somber look.
"Hey." She smiled. "Grandma said you can stay. I got you a blanket." Her tone was as soft as the blanket that she held out to him.
"Am I that much of a burden to you?" Cassy froze. Her brow furrowed, trying to think of a reason behind the question.
"Burden? No. Are you ok?" Cassy placed the blanket on the headrest of the recliner and held the fabric of his sleeve concerned. Wyatt bit his lip.
"I heard you guys. I'm just the adopted kid to everyone, aren't I?" The stairway light shined against them amongst the darkness of the living room.
"No." Cassy chose her words as she shook her head. "No, of course not." Cassy wrapped her arms around him and hugged tightly. Then, she looked at him intently. "Why do you think that?" Wyatt was silent for a moment and then opened his mouth to speak.
"...Ever since last year, people seem to look at me differently. They whisper and laugh when they pass me at school. Have you heard them?" He had a hurt demeanor about him.
"No. What did they say?"
"That... that no one wants me around, even my real parents. That if I died, no one would care." Wyatt rested his head against Cassy's shoulder. She wasn't sure what to do.
"Hey, they need to get a life. We're here to help you get through this, ok?" She looked at him with reassurance. He returned a saddened smile. "Now, let me show you to your room for the night."
______________________________________________________________________________
Cassy gasped, waking with a start. She sat up in her previously dark room. A teal light slightly illuminated from the hallway and traced back to the main level. What the... Her mind was still processing the interruption in sleep. Her surroundings had an eerie prick on her skin as she was lead to the source. On Cassy's way down the stairs, she bumped into Wyatt who, like her, woke up to explore the mystery.
"Do you know what that light is?" Cassy yawned. She felt almost hypnotized by the contrast of dark green to light blue.
"Did someone leave the TV on or something?" Wyatt whispered. He knew the impossibility of the source being the TV, but had no other explanation.
"I don't think the TV can glow this much." As they touched the last step, they began to hear indistinct voices.
"Do you hear that?" Wyatt asked her, bewildered. "I can't quite make out what they're saying..." He trailed off, listening.
"I think it's coming from the table." Cassy clutched his arm, stopping him from moving forward. "...Maybe we shouldn't look." He could hear the sudden fear in her voice now that she was fully awake. Then realization dawned on her. "Is our project nuclear?! Oh my God, we need to get out of here! It must be leaking radiation in the house!!" She quietly squealed.
"Shhhh!! It's not nuclear, Cass! So, calm the hell down, ...here." He grasped her hand with his and swallowed. "Alright, let's go check it out." She looked up at his tense expression and then down at their hands.
"Ok." Cassy tightened her grip as they moved towards the table one step at a time. The light became brighter as they approached. "Sh-should it be doing that?" Her voice trembled.
"No." Wyatt said with a slight whisper. In the center of the table, the cube glowed intensely right where they had left it. With both hands, Wyatt slowly reached for the small machine. He finally grabbed it and held it close to him. Everything stopped. The light and whispers became absent and only echoed throughout the household.
"Phew, glad that's over. I might need to take a closer look at this." Cassy wasn't as amused at the situation as Wyatt was.
"You think! I was waiting for it to explode or something!" The both of them spoke too soon. The cube in Wyatt's hands flashed a white light which threw the two of them onto the ground, knocking them unconscious.
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140,247 Literary Works • 673,061 Reviews
Hi MayCupcake,
Mailice back with a short review!
And again we start with the points that caught my eye while reading:
Great description!
It's just a matter of taste, but to me it always sounds strange when I read the name of a person who is related to a character who is a close relative.
I can see the story turning into more and more drama. (A good thing!)
Again a beautiful description and a good comparison.
It would be good for you to add that Wyatt says that. In some places it seems rushed and to that it can lead to a misunderstanding of the plot.
The chapter was wonderful. I enjoyed it and there was a great cliffhanger at the end, which leaves me in awe as it does every time with your chapters. I like your dialogue and the structure. I also like your short descriptions. One thing I think you could expand on is the scene between Cassy and Wyatt. After she catches up with him and invites him to spend the night, I found that point a little too quick, like there was something missing.
There was one thing that irritated me a bit in this chapter; that was the thought processes of Cassy and Rose. I think it's good that you included them, but I don't understand why it's so important for the reader to know what the grandmother is thinking. I didn't feel like it was coming from a specific person at the beginning, which led to me confusing Grandmother's thoughts with Cassy's. I think the idea behind giving Insight from some people is good, but find that you then have to present it a little differently so that there is no confusion. Cassy's thought processes can remain in italic, but Grandmother Rose's thought processes would either have to be written passively or paraphrased in such a way that the reader could "read" it from her face. For example, here you could change it a little:
"Grandmother Rose stared at her granddaughter in amazement. She was surprised that at such a moment she could think of Wyatt and not herself and her future. Rose sighed and thought to herself that she was just a teenager first."
The story is finally getting to a point where the plot is unfolding, which I like. However, the fact that this only occurs after a whole chunk of drama was again unexpected for me. I like that in this chapter you went one more layer deeper into the characters Cassy and Wyatt and you also recognise new characteristics. I didn't think it would get so sad at some points after reading the first two chapters and thought the story was more along the lines of amusing.
As the title continues to leave me a bit open to interpretation, I'm making a guess here that this whole setting and build up to this point (moving - no one likes Wyatt...) will lead to this cube from the end of the chapter maybe taking them somewhere else where they can escape. Still very excited to see where the story goes from here!
This was definitely a very great chapter with a turning point in the story.
Have fun writing!
Mailice.
Mailice, how did you read and review all three chapters so quickly? lol. Thanks a bunch for the likes too!
1. Yeah, I'll look through and try to make sure it's clear who's talking! It felt a little strange to me as well.
2. I think I wrote this in like 2 days? lol. So, that scene in particular wasn't as elaborated on as I would've liked.
3. Yeah, I also felt the thoughts of Rose and Cassy was all over the place. I'm gonna be looking over that too. Thanks for the edits!
4. Whelp I guess I gotta work on chapter four and editing these three!
Thank you for all your explanations on the reviews!
Your first question is pretty easy to answer; I had trouble with my Internet connection, so I started reviewing the next chapters. (I write my reviews usually on a Word doc)
Nice!
Myth here to review!
So starting off, the intro was good, but it seemed to start from Casey's point of view and then around here
it changes to Rose's point of view, and to be honest it took me a minute to understand this.
I don't know, maybe your just doing it from a third, person point of view, but I just thought I'd say I found this kinda confusing.
anyway, moving on I don't know if this was intentional or not but id just like to point out (in case you didn't notice) that there are two ? marks there.
well done, I really liked this part, it says a lot about both Rose, and Cassy.
now this transition of points of view is not very confusing at all, nice job. (also I love that Rose, called Wyatt Sparks)
and the next bit of dialogue is very nice, easy to read and understand, the talk with Wyatt when she brings him the blanket is really sad but says a lot about his character, well done on that part!
oooh, mysterious great starting for the next part.
also nice to see their different reactions and a very good ending to this chapter.
overall, there was very little confusing or hard to understand about this chapter, i couldn't find any grammatical errors, and I really enjoyed reading this chapter.
Well Done, keep writing -Myth
Thank you!
1. Yeah, I can see how that can be confusing at the start there. It seems to work much better when Rose says something and then I show her thoughts, instead of Cassy's response and then Rose's reaction. I think I'll work that section a bit.
2. Yes, I intentionally put two question marks there lol. I wanted the question to have more of an urgent, caught off guard kind of feel to it.
3. And thanks! I was trying to put some effort into character development this chapter.
4. Yay! I'm glad you enjoyed it!
I enjoyed this chapter more than the last one! Let's go on and review:
I wonder what happened to the frogs? This first part of the story is told from Rose's POV, right?
Oh, the question is asked!
That's suspicious.
Wyatt has to stay because of the frogs.
She let's him stay, and she has guilt? From what?
Hmm. . .I guess the guest bedroom doesn't have a bed.
Ohh, conflict!
That's sweet of him!
What is going on?!
I'm thinking people came from the science project.
I love the reveal!
Why did he leave it on the table? Oh my gosh! Don't touch it! I'm thinking dimensions or time travel with the cube.
I knew you shouldn't have touched it, Wyatt! I love the cliffhanger.
Overall, this chapter is more exciting than the last. Good Job!
-Sincerely, Mingan
Follow you heart and nothing can go wrong. (Concerning writing.)
Thank you so much!