And Alex was right. Jack didn’t hear anything from him besides one little note left in his mail box that said – soon. It was like Alex would’ve never been in his life. Not that he actually was, just his notes, but still…after notes regularly left in his mail box or on his coffee table for weeks and now there was nothing that would show that it was real. Nothing reminded him of Alex and after two weeks there were nothing as long as he didn’t look at his coffee table. He hadn’t removed the notes as a weak reminder that this all thing was real.

That was till today he got this note with one word ‘soon’on it. It all came rushing back to him – all those memories of earl mornings, with Alex’s steps and sometimes voice behind his doors, all those weird notes witch actually didn’t make any sense, but were still so important to him and hope that there might be someone who cares about him. Cares for real and not because they’re his friends or family members, but because he wants to.

But then some other thought interrupted his mind. He remembered that there were some note in witch Alex mentioned something about what might and probably will happen sometime before they’ll meet. He scurries across the room to his coffee table and starts flicking through all the notes, some smaller than others, throwing some on the floor, before he finds the one he’s been looking for. The one were Alex wrote about these storms and…other things that might happen.

I’m just six months older than you are, that’s no big deal, I guess. It’s pretty common thing for us to be a bit older, so we can always be there when we’re needed. I’ve met others who’re even seven years older than their human, but none of this makes sense to you. Probably, so I’ll just leave you with that.
There’s one thing you need to know and I’m allowed to tell you. Well, not all of it, but the part that will affect you. It’s about the way we’ll meet. We’ll meet after that will happen, but it will have effect on your world and you might feel it.
There will be problems with electricity, your transports and all lights on streets might broke down. Also might be earthquakes in places no one would expect them to be and storms, rain, wind, maybe snow. Your technologies won’t be able to predict any of this. All I can tell you is that it won’t take much time. These won’t be days, maybe just some hours. Some of our eldest says that things like this have happened before, they’ve heard of it from their ancestors and they all say that this is a short amount of time.
I can’t promise that we’ll meet right after that, because I won’t know where to find you, but I’m sure it’ll happen sooner than you would expect.

Soon. So if all of the things that this Alex had wrote are true, there might be some things to get ready for. No one will know anything about this, because apparently our technologies won’t be able to predict this. How is that possible! Okay, our technologies might not be able to predict exact time of earthquakes, but most of the time it shows that there is something wrong going on with the earth underneath our feet. So how does this Alex know what might happen, but human technologies don’t?

He might be out of his mind, but better be prepared not sorry. He should buy some things...some candles, food, something…what do people even buy when there’s something about to happen? Usually they know what will happen so they know what to buy, but in this weird situation Jack has no idea what he needs.

Jack got up from the floor and made his way to his room. As comfortable as these sweatpants are he can’t go out of the house wearing them. Once he got in his room he tossed them on to his bed, found some black jeans, clean hoodie, his wallet, phone and keys and were on the way to closest supermarket. While waiting for the red light to change he thought that maybe he should get something for Rian too. He might think that this is too much, but Jack cares about him and if there’s really something about to happen he might feel better knowing that Rian is prepared for that something. He pulls out his phone and finds Rian’s number. It’s not the best idea to drive and talk on the phone, but it’s kind of an emergency right now.

“Y’llo!”

“You’re drunk?” Jack asks spotting the supermarket at the end of the street.

“What? No! Just watching some weird tv show for the past hour. Still have no idea what’s going on there,” Rian mumbles an answer, clearly somehow a bit interested in the show.

“Apparently something good enough to keep you there for the past hour. Anyway, I’m going to shop right now and… ”

“No way! You’re shopping! Why didn’t you call me earlier? I need to see this!”

“Shut up! I just wanted to make sure you’re home, cause I will drop by after I’m done here.”

“And then you will tell me how it went,” sounds like Rian has lost all interest about that weird show.

“What?” Jack asks, parking his car and getting out.

“Well, about the shopping,” he says in a dreamy voice.

“Shut up! It’s not like I haven’t been shopping at all.”

“Yeah, but on your own, that’s different story.”

“I’ve done that before,” Jack mumbles. Maybe he should leave Rian out of this, he can be annoying and he wouldn’t miss him that much. Maybe, “whatever, don’t leave your house, I’ll be there soon.”

Soon. That’s the word that is stuck in his mind as he hangs up on Rian. Alex didn’t say when exactly this soon will happen, he didn’t know it himself. It can happen now when he’s outside in a half empty parking lot, it can happen when he’s at Rian’s or when he’s on the way to his apartment. Either way he won’t be ready for this even knowing that he needs to wait for something. How can someone be ready for something?

Standing under the bright lights of the shop he feels lost and not because he’s shopping on his own, but because he really has no idea of what to buy in this situation. Some candles won’t hurt anyone, some water bottles, and juice [because seriously, who can live with only water without any taste], some weird food in cans which needs no preparations and this all doubles when he takes everything of these items for Rian too.

“Preparing for romantic night?” cashier asks with a shy smile on her face, counting all candles, but her smile falls as she notices water bottles and the weird canned food.

“Something like that,” he quietly answers, pays for everything and leaves.

The drive to Rian took less than fifteen minutes thanks to the early hours of Sunday morning when everyone who’s normal are still in their beds. Before getting out of the car he puts everything that’s his on the backseat and takes everything that is for Rian. When he’s done with organizing what’s his and what’s not he gets out of car and makes his way to Rian’s front doors. Before he even has a chance to knock, Rian opens the doors.

“Are you going to show me what you bought?”

“No, I bought this for you,” Jack pushes past Rian inside of the warm house. His house is not big, one floor, three rooms, one bathroom and small kitchen. Not much, but it was perfect for both of them when they first moved in.

“I don’t remember asking you to buy anything for me,” Rian follows Jack into his kitchen, “you know, you needed to take off your shoes. I kind of cleaned here yesterday.”

“It doesn’t look like that,” he says in a sarcastic manner and puts the bag with the bought items on Rian’s kitchen table.

“Yeah, because you just ruined my hard work. What is this anyway? You took me seriously when I said you can’t shop on your own? You didn’t need to buy me anything to prove me wrong,” he leans over the bag on his table to look inside, “really Jack? Candles? I’ve said it many times and I won’t deny that you’re good looking guy, but I won’t sleep with you and I don’t care how desperate you are.”

“No! I don’t want to sleep with you, you’re not my type and you know that.”

“That hurt,” Rian mumbled under his nose while lining all candles on his table, “then what is it all about?”

Rian will think that he’s crazy, but he’s said it more time these weeks than ever before so one more time wouldn’t hurt.

“Remember I told you about what Alex wrote? About those…storms and earthquakes and everything else?”

“And you really believe him? You haven’t even met this guy and you already believe everything he writes to you?” he looks at Jack, completely forgotten about water bottle in his hands.

“But what if this is true?! Don’t you think it’s better to be prepared?”

“You need to see some doctor or something. I’m sorry Jack, but this is not normal. You have to hear what you’re saying!”

“Fine! If nothing will happen, not even one thing of what he mentioned, I will go to whoever you want me to go, but for now just take this and be happy that I spent my money on you.”

“I appreciate that so thank you for that,” he finally remembers about water bottle and puts it down, reaching in the bag to take out the rest of what is left in there.

---

He’s about to say the total price for all the notebooks and pens the girl wants to buy when all the lights disappear in the little book shop.

“No,” he whispers, looking out of the window behind the girl and noticing that all street is dark. No lights are on the street nor the other shops or apartments above them. Everything is dark and silent.

“I’m sure it’s nothing, they’ll fix it fast,” girl says too positively.

“Yeah, probably,” he answers, trying to sound as normal as possible, “I can write down all these so that I remember that I sold them and you can get them now if you really need them.”

“Thank you so much,” she looks so relieved about Jack’s suggestion.

“Okay then,” he pulls out his phone to open the calculator, but his phone is off, “can you give me your phone so we know the price for all this?” he asks as nicely as he can, trying to push the image of Alex’s note out of his mind.

“Sure,” she chirps and pulls her phone out of her bag, “Oh, it’s…not working…” the positive look on her face falls.

“Well, then we need to be very good with math,” Jack chuckles.

Eventually they manage to do it, she pays and leaves Jack alone. He wants to leave and go home, where he have warm candles and food and water and his bed, but he can’t leave now, can he? It’s not like this something is happening right now. It can be like the girl said – they’ll fix it fast. He spends almost twenty minutes in the twilight. Thank god, he never worked late shifts, otherwise he would be left in complete dark.

His head shots up as the doors opens and someone walks in.

“Why are you still here?” oh, his boss. Well, that’s kind of good.

“I wasn’t sure I was able to leave. They might fix it and…”

“They might, but phones are not working, I tried to call them, but as I said phones aren’t working so you can leave. There’s no use for you to stay here now. I’ll call you when everything will be okay.”

“Yeah, sure. Oh, I wrote here some girls purchase, she was here right before that happened and she really needed those notebooks, so I wrote them down here.”

“Okay, thank you and now leave.”

His boss is weird, short man, a little over weight and with a round face. He always acts like he should be somewhere else, like he’s in hurry and most of the time is living in some different universe. Probably that’s the reason he owns the book shop. He kind of owns all of these different universes.

It’s still dark outside, no lights, no cars, some people passes by as he walks as fast as possible to get home. Wind seems colder than it was before, but maybe it’s just because Jack wants it to be colder, he kind of waits for it to be colder and stronger than it normally would be. He’s so close to his house, with his apartment on the fourth floor, he almost feels the smell of candles. That’s impossible, but that’s what he wants to feel so that’s what he feels.

Light shake under his feet makes him stop. No, no, no, no. This can’t be happening. Not here and not now. Another shake, this time stronger, makes him run. He feels like he would be a little bit drunk, from fear or from the light shaking under his feet he doesn’t know, but right now he couldn’t care less about that. He runs inside of his building, looks at the elevator, but he’s not going to step in that box now. It’s probably not working anyway.

When he reaches the fourth floor he’s out of breath. When he have elevator he thinks of fourth floor the same way he thinks of the first, but now, when he needs to use stairs the fourth floor is equal to tenth. First thing he finds are candles and matches. He lights five candles and puts them all on the coffee table while Jack himself curls under thin blanket on the couch. He reaches over for the remote and turns on the tv. Nothing. Really Jack? You thought that that thing will work? He puts the remote back on the table and curls in the small ball watching at the small, flickering flames of the candles.

---

“…lions had injured three antelopes, one goat and killed one man who was still at the zoo…”
“…about three hundred people are still missing…”
“She left the house few minutes before that storm came on…she didn’t return…”
“Most of the people who were in the store are dead. We’re still looking for survivors…”
“…tsunami had destroyed Miami and Los Angeles coasts. If your family members or friend were about to be somewhere near the coast, please call the number below…”

Jack opened his eyes and looked at the screen and saw the number. He don’t need to call. He’s far from Miami or Los Angeles so is his family and friends. Two candles are still burning and he sits up to put them out when his phone rings.

“Yeah,” his voice still filled with sleep.

“Jack Barakat?”

“Umm…yes,” he blows out the candles and turns out the tv.

“Your friend, Rian Dawson said to call you.”

“What? Where is he?”

“He’s in the hospital and you should come to see him.”

“Is it…is it anything serious?”

“No, nothing too serious. He was lucky.”

Notes

well, that's long enough! and as I said something did happen!
while I wrote the book shop part I listened to this and I think it kind of goes together with it, or maybe it's just me ;D