Science Fiction for Young Readers, grade 4 up
Story and Pictures by Terry Gibson ©

TABITHA'S SECRET, Chapter 4

     During supper, everyone was silent.  Mother
was reading at the table.  Not surprised, Gregory
understood her need; hadn't she said more than
once, "All day at school it's talk talk talk"?  No
wonder she was tired and in no mood for more of
it.  He saw that Tab was picking her way through
the beef stew, probably still "shook" by her
experience, and with their mother there, unable to
talk about it anyway.



     Left to himself, Gregory pondered Tab's
problem.  There was no way she should be able to
float like that, and yet she did.  It was a mystery
beyond anything he had known, even on TV or
in the sci-fi books he had read.  He looked at
Tab, who stared at her plate as she ate, and he
could hardly wait until dishes were done to talk
with her.  She had promised....
                 

     After supper, Tab knew she'd be in for a
rough time.  What was happening to her was far too
scary.  With her stomach in such a knot she could
hardly swallow, she was in the grip of fears that
swept like waves over her: they were coming more
often and without warning, and so much stronger
each time... More than just embarrassing.  This
last one was dangerous.  There were scratches on
her hands, and her ear smarted.  The stinging of
places on her back made her hope there were no
bloodstains on her shirt, and all were today's
proof she could not control it at all.
     And then there was Greggy.  He had helped all
right, or she would still be stuck to the ceiling
and Mom would have called 911, and the newspaper
photographers would be flashing their pictures to
put her on the front pages of all the newspapers,
headlines would scream, "Local Girl a Human Fly"
and the kids at school would call it Tabby Disease
and she'd never be able to raise her eyes again...

     Yes, she should be glad Greggy had helped.
He was the one who loosened its grip, and the one
who broke her fall.  Her arm and shoulder were
really sore even so, but falling head first, she
could have been really badly hurt and she knew it.
     The trouble was that now Greggy knew.  He had
seen it with his own eyes.  Would he tell?  Most
likely he'd blab it all and get her in trouble
with Mom, like he did when she got punished at
school.  She hadn't heard the end of it for weeks,
how ashamed her mother was, a TEACHER's child
doing something so stupid... No thanks.

     She stole a glance at her brother and found
his eyes full upon her, with the strangest
expression.  No smirks there, and no teasing as
she would have expected, just very thoughtful.

     Tabitha sought to escape her worries by
thinking of other things.  Fortunately Mother was
quiet, as she often was after a hard day at
school.  With troubles of her own, her mother
wouldn't notice the silence of her children.
Tabitha knew all about it, how so many teachers
had lost their jobs when they changed everything
in the schools.  Although they had to move to
another town, and to other schools, at least their
mother still had a job.  Many did not...and so her
mother did not really complain when she'd talk
about the rude and unruly kids in her classes, but
just was tired all the time.

     There were so many changes.  This old house
for instance...  So different from the one they
had while Daddy was still with them.  It must have
been a splendid place a hundred years ago...  the
fancy wide staircase that curved upstairs, the
bevelled glass doors, and the ceilings!  They
don't make ceilings nearly so high anymore.  Mother
complained how expensive it was to heat a house
with ten-foot ceilings, but more likely the place
just needed more insulation.
     Still, it was a wonder she wasn't hurt worse
when she fell on Greggy.  Or, she smiled, Greggy
either.  She could have squashed him!
     And this place wasn't so bad.  She loved the
huge old trees, and the way the lawns all ran
together without fences so it felt a lot like a
park.  She wasn't so thrilled about the chore of
keeping it mowed.                  

     When dishes were done and their mother had
settled to mark books in the living room, the kids
went upstairs, but not to do homework as their
mother thought.  "All right," Greg said as he sat
on Tab's bed, "shoot."
     Resigned to her part in the promise, Tab
said, "I don't know where to start."                
     "The beginning."

     Tab thought for a while, and idly noticed
some long strands of her blond hair still hanging
from the ceiling.  She shivered; it had been no
dream.  She began, "I guess it started with the
Science Fair at school."
     She saw the puzzled look on Greggy's face.
"Yes, I chose the Force of Gravity." She thought
about her search through internet sites, and all
those books at the school and public library,
where most of the books said the same things as if
they had copied from each other.  "I found a
little book that was different from the others.
It told how a group of little kids could lift a
sleeping man AND the bed he was on, each with only
one finger."
      "No."
     "Yes.  Just by chanting incantations."
     "That's impossible."
     "I know.  That's what Ms. Tempest said too."
Tab remembered telling her science teacher about
the book.  Excited, she'd gone on and on about it
before she noticed the frown on her teacher's
face.  "It was SO embarrassing!"  She felt the
swell of anger all over again, and continued,
"Tempest said,"--mimicking the scorn as she
quoted-- "'That occult nonsense is not Science,
Tabitha.  Forget it.'"
     Tab squirmed, put her other leg under her,
and flung back her long hair.  "I hate her."

           That's when she noticed that Gregory didn't
     laugh or anything.  It helped.  "I didn't
     believe her," she said.

     Gregory nodded.  "I saw that."
     Encouraged, she went on, "More than anything,
I want to show that stupid teacher she's wrong!  I
want the grand prize at the Science Fair, and then
I'll tell her off--"
     "Tabby!"
     "Well, maybe not....they'd tell Mother."
Still, even thinking of it now made her smile.


     To Gregory, it was the same smile he had seen
while she floated there above his head.  "So, did
you say the--uh, 'incantations'?  Whatever?"
     "I wish I had, because then I'd have some
idea how to control it.  I mean, I didn't say
ANYTHING and I kept floating higher and higher.
You saw it yourself."

     Gregory agreed.  The young scientist in him
asked interesting questions--'hypotheses,' his
teacher called them... with no answers, yet.
What force made it work?  What facts were given?
One: there were no special words or spells that he
had seen.  Two: like on TV, had someone cast a
spell on his sister?  First off he did not believe
in spells, so why?  Second, who?  Put that one
aside.  Three, was his mother right that the
'occult' was an evil thing?  Was 'the occult' so
dangerous that it did nasty things to you on its
own?  Was just reading about it unsafe?  Were
these 'the forces of evil?'

     Suddenly it had turned from a curiosity,
through Tab's problem, into something very
serious.  If her floating was scary, it was
nothing compared to what the tight fists in his
gut could guess.
     "Greggy, what's wrong?"
     "Uh, sorry.  Thinking."
     "Tell me."
     "Say please."
     Tabitha burst into giggles.  "Again?"
     "Guess not, eh?"  He wouldn't say he had just
wondered if she was being punished for something.
"Well, since you don't use any words, there has to
be some other reason for it.  But what?"
     "I have no idea."
     Her super-private journal had everything in
it, all the things that had happened, all the
fears....  All the things she couldn't tell.  A
secret is only a secret if you don't tell anyone
at all.

     Gregory saw it on her face--the narrowed
eyes, the frown-- and knew that something very
heavy was bothering her.  In the past he might
have given her a hard time. That was in the past.
He felt so much older now, suddenly responsible.
He knew her secret.  Now they both had a secret.
     What horrible things might happen to Tabby
would also happen to him, and would hurt their
mother terribly.  Their mother had far too many
worries to need any more.  It was not so hard to
decide he'd leave it like that.
     Why should Tab tell him, really?
     "I guess you've got enough troubles already."
He rose to go.  "I'm sorry I was so nosy."
     "No--"  Tab held him back.  Her brother had
come in, not to laugh at her or tease her, but
because he knew she was in trouble.  He had
stayed, and still had not made fun of her.  Why,
he had saved her--who knows how long the spell
would have lasted if he hadn't helped?  "No," she
repeated.
     He stopped, and heard her tell him to stay.
     Both were surprised.
              

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