Humans Don't Make Good Familiars

Part 9: Back to Work

I woke up in a confused haze, my alarm blaring telling me exactly how late for work I was. "CRAP!" I shouted and flung myself out of bed, but most of my body was still asleep so rather than a fluid motion, it was more like a stumbling drunk monkey trying to dance ballet, then falling down. Still half wrapped in my blanket, I quickly stood up and ran to the bathroom to brush my teeth and take the fastest shower in human history. I grabbed a shirt, pants, and socks from my drawer and put on deodorant. All in all, I was dressed and out the door in fifteen minutes, half an hour late for work. I called my boss telling him I was on my way; he was chill about it as this was probably the first time I had been late in the full year I had been working there. My job was data entry, just something to pay the bills until I was finished with my engineering degree next year. I arrived for work and clocked in quickly.

"Hey Jake," my boss said startling me from behind.

"Goodness!" I yelped in surprise. "Oh, hey Mr. Vidal, sorry for being late; I overslept. Yesterday was pretty hectic." I explained.

"It's no problem, everyone is late sometimes." He said calmly. Mr. Vidal was a great boss, forgiving, willing to compromise, and good at leading us rather than just giving out orders. I've had some bad bosses before, but he wasn't one of them. "What made yesterday so hectic, did something happen after you left here?" He asked.

No one, not even my family, knew about Suma and that other world, and I definitely wasn't going to tell them. "Yeah, a friend of mine called me and needed some help with stuff, so we spent hours working on that. I didn't even get to sleep until 10:00 AM this morning." I told him.

"Wow, so you only got like four hours of sleep? Dang, what was so important?" He asked surprised. I work afternoon shifts from 3:00 PM to 8:00 PM, so normally I just go to sleep after I get home and wake up for college at 10:00. Thankfully I didn't have classes today.

"Oh... he was having medical issues, so I took him to the hospital and brought him home this morning." I lied.

"Well, I hope he gets to feeling better, and if you need to leave an hour or two early today to catch up on some sleep or take care of your friend that's fine. Nothing important is going on today." Mr. Vidal said as he went to his office. With that, I got to work at my computer. My job was simple, take information from forms and transfer them to digital files on our computers. I trudged on for a few hours until my stomach started to rumble at about 6:00, but I kept Instant noodles in my desk to tie me over until I could leave. Just as I put the soup in the microwave, I got a call, but not on my phone.

"Jake, are you there?" Suma's voice said in my head. I pulled out my phone and placed it to my ear to make it seem like I was talking on the phone.

"Hey Suma, what's up?" I said.

"Are you free to be summoned? I need a bit of help." She said.

"Um, not at the moment, if I leave now I might be too tired to finish work when I get back. Can it wait another..." I looked down at my phone for the time, "two hours?"

"Yes, I think it can wait. Just call me when you are free, and I will explain." She said.

"Okay, see you in a bit." I said and put my phone back in my pocket. A second later the microwave beeped, and my soup was ready. I took it, and a fork, back to my desk to eat. As I sat down, my coworker, Melony, walked up to me.

"Jake, do you have a copy of the Greely file on your computer? Mine got corrupted in last week's power outage and they requested a copy to be sent to them." She asked.

"Um sure, I think so," I said and sat my noodles down to search my computer. "Here we are," I said and emailed her a copy of the file. "Okay, I sent it to your work email," I said.

"You're a life saver Jake," she said and walked away. I went back to eating and checked my phone for messages. A text from my mum asking me to stop by after work to get a few things from storage from when I still lived there. They had mentioned it before, but I kept forgetting... mostly because of everything that has been happening with Suma. While I ate, I messaged her telling her that I would be by after work to collect everything. I also thought about how much had changed for me over these last few weeks, how much I had seen. It was like going to space, or being the first man on Mars, but no one knew. I took my boss up on his offer and clocked out forty-five minutes early. I drove to my mum's and gave her a big hug as soon as I saw her. She had just seen me last week, but it had been twice that long at least from my perspective.

My mother was a wonderful woman, and my dad had passed away last year, so she was always trying to keep busy. Which was the reason I had to clean out the storage shed, so that she could use the space for her latest project or hobby. "How have you been?" She asked as she handed me a box to put into my car.

"I've been really good, made a new friend, Suma." I told her.

"Oh... and when will I get to meet this Suma?" She asked. My mum had been one me for years to get a girlfriend.

"It's not like that mum, she is just a friend, and anyway she lives far away... in another country." I said.

"Another country? How did you meet then?" She asked.

"Oh... we met years ago, back when I was still in high school." I told her.

"But I thought you said she was a new friend?" My mum wondered.

"Yeah... I mean I knew her, but I didn't KNOW her. We just reconnected when we bumped into one another. She works in... America, as a... history professor." I lied.

"What was she doing in England? Visiting family?" Mum asked.

"Yeah, her parents still live here so she comes to see them for holidays and birthdays and stuff." I said. We talked some more, and I lied some more, but a few minutes later my car was packed, and I was on my way home. Just as I got home and laid the last of the boxes on my living room floor, Suma shouted in my head.

"JAKE, I DO NOT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING, BUT GET READY TO LOOK AS SCARY AS POSSIBLE!"

"Ah! Loud..." I said as I began to disappear. I had no time to think, the next thing I knew I was standing in the middle of an alleyway, and Suma was standing, or hiding, behind me. To make matters worse, we were cornered by three lager dark colored nymphs and their incredibly angry looking beast familiars.