Coral had been crying for about three minutes, and now she was full-out sobbing. Slowly, she started calming down. When the tears were all spent, Coral wiped her eyes on the back of her hand. Then she realized that there were footsteps coming towards her. It was Mom! Coral wished she could just disappear through the wall. She wished that she hadn’t been crying so loudly. And most of all, she wished that she didn’t have her power. Then a funny thing happened. She got a tingly feeling and she heard the water whisper mysteriously, “Wish #1 granted,” and her vision went fuzzy. Then she was pulled through to the other side of the barrier, leaving Mom to wonder if she was going crazy. Coral blinked and opened her eyes. She was sitting on the steps outside her front door with no idea how she got there. The rain was still pounding down with full force, but somehow she wasn’t wet. The rain seemed to be avoiding her, so although she was sitting in the middle of a rainstorm, she was completely dry. Coral rubbed her eyes and tried to remember... I was sitting by the wall of water, crying, then Mom started walking over. Then I heard a voice say ‘Wish #1 granted.’ Then... did I fall through the wall or something? Coral stood up. Whatever was protecting her from the rain was still working. She was grateful because otherwise, she’d be soaking wet. She glanced back at the water barrier, which still looked as solid as ever. Well, I might as well do what I set out to do. Coral turned and set off toward the park. Little did she know, Veronica was watching from her bedroom window. ************************************************************************** The park was empty when Coral arrived. That shouldn’t have been a surprise, considering that everyone was in their houses, hiding from the rain. Coral decided to activate her plan in the clearing where this all started. That probably wasn’t necessary, but she felt like it was as good a place as any. She walked to the clearing, which was soaking wet, like everything else in the park. Coral took a deep breath. Okay. I can do this. I can control the - Bzzzzt! Coral frowned. Her cell phone? Now? Couldn’t whoever was calling wait a few minutes? She pulled it out of her pocket and answered. “Look, I’m kind of busy right now, could you -” “Coral, we need to talk. Please.” Coral almost fell over with surprise. Veronica? She recognized her sister’s voice, but since when had Veronica even known the word ‘please’? And why was she calling her? “Hey, Veronica -” Coral began nervously. “I was watching through my window, and saw you sneak out to complete your little ‘scheme’...” Veronica interrupted. A million thoughts began to race through Coral’s head. What if she tells Mom! Why was she watching me? Who does she think she is, a secret spy or something? Hey, wait… Veronica can’t know about my power! She only saw me walk out the door. Her thoughts were interrupted by Veronica’s voice. “...so maybe I could help you.” She paused for a moment. “Hello? Are you awake, Coral?” “Hmm? Oh, yeah.” “Well, what do you think?” Coral was confused. “About what?” “My idea, you dummy.” “Oh, it sounds great.” But there was a minor -well, actually major- flaw in Veronica’s plan to help Coral: the fact that they were dealing with a crisis that was caused by Coral’s power and would probably need to be fixed by it too, and Veronica didn’t know her secret! “So where are you?” Veronica was saying. “I can come over and -” “Wait!” Coral blurted. She couldn’t let Veronica find out about her power. “Um... I think, well, maybe we should...” “Spit it out,” Veronica said, clearly annoyed. “Can I help or not?” “Yeah, totally, but um… we should plan first!” There was silence on the other end of the line. Finally Veronica replied “Fine. Let’s start with this. What exactly are you planning to do?” Coral groaned inwardly. How was she going to do this without telling Veronica about her power? Why couldn’t she just be a normal girl with normal problems and no weird powers? “I said, what exactly are you planning to do? It can’t take long, we have to be home before dinner.” Coral winced and held the phone away from her ear. Veronica could be a very loud talker sometimes. “Hold on a minute, V. It’s getting really, REALLY windy out here, so I’ll be coming home to talk. And to help with dinner. See you in a bit!” She hung up.
Phew. Coral knew she hadn’t made up the best excuse, but it had to hold Veronica back for just a little while. Of course, it was a lie too, because Coral wasn’t affected at all by the wind or rain. The force field around her (after some thinking, that’s what she decided it was) was still working perfectly, there wasn’t a drop of water on her anywhere. Now, back to the original plan. She took a step forward, then froze. Oh no. She hadn’t even thought of how she was going to stop the storm. Is there a chant or something? A spell? Coral groaned. How unlike her, she was always so neat and organized with little things like schoolwork. Yet here she was, trying to save the town or something, and she was completely unprepared! Calm down, she told herself. Coral decided to control it how she always did; by concentrating and letting it come naturally. She summoned a sphere of water in her hand and imagined all the rain flowing into that one ball. The rain gathered into one current flowing into the water ball. It’s working! Coral could have jumped for joy, but suddenly she heard a voice behind her. “Don’t you think I can tell when someone’s lying to my face?” Coral dropped her ball of water and whirled around. It was Veronica.
