"Great!" The fairy grabbed Elijah's hand and yanked him into the air. The group flew out of the shade of the tree. Elijah tried to look around to see if he spotted Denis anywhere out with the other flower fairies. He hoped that he started on the other side of the field today.
He noticed the flowers and grass start to disappear. It turned to dirt. He looked up and stopped, pulling his arm away from Rowen. The others stopped.
Elijah stared at the house. He felt a shiver run down his spine as he remembered what Denis had said yesterday.
"Dude. Come on." One of the fairies said. Elijah didn't reply. The three chuckled lightly.
"Are you scared?" The other laughed. "Fine. If you're gonna be a pussy just go home." They fly closer. Elijah looked over and noticed that the car was gone. He sighed and flew over.
The group slipped in through a hole in the screen of one of the windows that was cracked open. They looked around the huge kitchen.
"Holy shit!" One of the fairies flew off and landed on the counter next to a drying rack for bowls. "These are huge! It's like a pool!"
The other fairies went over to look at some of the other things in the room. Elijah stayed by the window. Rowen flew back to the window.
"I've charted the perfect track." He cheered. The other two came over.
"We'll start here. Go along the open space between the counters and the island. We'll do–does five laps sound good? First one to make it to that dining table wins." Rowan explained.
"We doing rough rules?" One of the fairies asked.
"Was that a trick question, Roxy?" The other fairy laughed.
"Pushing and sabotage is allowed on all rounds but the first. You can cut through the counters, but not the island. I'm looking at you Marcel." Rowan clarified. "Last two rounds we'll do counters only." They all lined up at the edge of the window sill.
Elijah looked around the kitchen. He took a deep breath. 'Just get through the race and you can go home,' he said to himself.
"Ready? Go!" Rowan called. They all took off. Roxy got off to a good start, being on the inside. But she got passed by Rowan after she tried to slow down a little to turn the corner. Elijah was in third, Marcel was behind him. He'd always been kinda slow.
They all finished the first lap. Roxy moved more towards the inside to cut the corner better. As she and Rowan got side by side, he shoved her back in a way that made her spin slightly. She fell all the way to fourth.
Rowan was still in the lead after the second round. Marcel decided to try to cut through the counters. That was proven to be more difficult than everyone expected. He dropped behind dramatically. It pretty much left only the three in the race now. Rowan turned to laugh at him, only to not turn fast enough and let Elijah pass him. He finished the third lap in first.
The fourth lap they all moved over to the counters. Marcel had given up and was sitting at the dining table to verify the winner. The counter was covered in random objects and boxes from the humans still unpacking their things. Rowan noticed that they were coming up on a box. Based on the rules, they all had to go over it. He slowed down slightly so he was closer to Roxy. As they were flying over it, he shoved her downwards. She tumbled down into the open box. That just left the last two.
They were on the final lap. Rowan was slowly losing speed to exhaustion but Elijah was flying perfectly fine. If anything, the hope of ending the race as quickly as possible was helping encourage him. Rowan began to get frustrated. He attempted to grab Elijah's foot to yank him backwards but was too far.
