Jack Frost - 10

Siobahn watched Forget as she kicked Jack in the head and frowned.
“No matter what I do you’re going to come with me, right?”
“Yous gots that right.” She said, concentrating on kicking.
Siobahn sighed and watched Jack for a second and breathed in.
“Jack, I need you to come with me for a moment.”
He looked at her in confusion for a second and then shook his head.
“I don’t know you.”
“Yes you do. It’s me, Siobahn. I need to take you outside.”
“For what?”
Forget suddenly seemed to do a series of combo hits and looked more like a video game fighter, doing all sorts of things. Siobahn got angry and when Forget came down for another landing with Jack’s head, she punched her across the room. Because Jack couldn’t see Forget, he thought Siobahn was punching at him and screamed, getting up and slamming against the wall behind him.
“What is your problem, Lady?!” he screamed.
“Yeah!” Forget growled from the floor. “What gives?!”
“You were making everything worse!” Siobahn shouted to the floor.
“Hey, I’m just doing my’s job! My name is Forget, that’s what I do!”
“You’re crazy, Lady. And you’re supposed to be a doctor?”
“No, I’m a therapist.” Siobahn turned to Jack and held out her hand to him. “I’m not crazy, Jack. I’m here to help you.”
“They why did you try to punch me?”
“I wasn’t trying to punch you. I was removing a nuisance… Please, Jack. Believe me when I say that I’m here to help you.”
Jack looked at her skeptically, glancing at her and her hand.
“If… if I go with you, will you leave me alone afterward?”
“Yes, I will leave you alone.”
Jack grabbed her hand and she smiled, leading him out of the room.

As they trekked across the field toward the small patch of woods, Jack was beginning to think this was a bad idea. He had no idea who this lady was and she seemed crazy herself. What if she was actually a patient and just posing as a therapist? What if she was going to kidnap him? He suddenly had doubts and dug his heels into the ground.
“Jack?”
“I don’t know you… I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“Jack, you have to. The world needs you.”
He turned his head a little.
“What do you mean?”
“If you just come on, you’ll see…”
“No!” he yanked his hand from hers. “I want to know what’s going on and where you’re taking me, now! If you don’t tell me, I’ll scream so that someone comes to get us.”
Siobahn sighed and thought how to explain everything.
“I’ve already explained this to you once but I can try again. You will probably not believe me again but… So, it looks like Old Man Winter found a way to make you, the personification of Jack Frost, into a human. You belong to nature and you are the thing that makes rain turn into snow, a cool breeze on a warm day, make things chilly. If you do not go back to nature, the world will go into a heat wave of mass proportions. I’ve been taking to your friend, Death, and he said that Mother Nature has a way to get back to normal.”
Jack blinked at her and turned around.
“You’re crazy. I can’t believe I even thought coming with you was a good idea.”
He began walking back to the facility as Siobahn watched him go. She balled up her fists.
“Your life is a lie, Jack! Whatever you think you remember is nothing! You’re not human!”
Jack turned around and walked back over to her, getting in her face.
“You know nothing about my life!”
“Well what do you know about it? Does it even seem real to you? How did you end up here, Jack?”
“I ended up here because I fell down a flight of stairs and woke up thinking I was Jack Frost. But I know that I’m not anymore and I want to go home.”
“What home?! Where do you live, Jack?! Where did you come from?! TELL ME!”
Jack watched Siobahn and felt sorry for her. She seemed to want him to believe her so desperately. But she was acting like a mad woman.
“I live in New York, in a large apartment complex on the fourth story. That’s why I fell, because I wasn’t paying attention.”
“Hey, that was the last job we had together.” Death said, coming up behind her.
“What do you mean?”
“Our last job was some guy who was going down a flight of stairs outside of a New York apartment complex. He lived on the fourth floor and when he was coming down he slipped on the frosted stairs and fell down the flight, breaking his neck.”
“So… he’s mixing up his work with his memories?”
“Yeah… ask him if he was with a friend when he fell.”
“Jack, w-were you with someone when you fell?”
Jack blinked. “Yeah… my friend, Shini.”
“That’s me!” Death yelled, jumping up and down, losing his hand out of his pocket in the excitement. “Look, Memory is there.”
Siobahn looked at Jack’s head, where a tiny man seemed to be doing river dance on top of it. Forget was still there though, glowering at Memory.
“How do you know that?” Jack asked, walking closer.
“Because I read your file.” Siobahn lied. “I was just testing you to see if you still believed yourself to be Jack Frost. This, what I’m doing now, is also a test.”
“What kind of test is done in the forest?” he asked, turning his head.
“Well, when you were still thinking you were Jack Frost, you took me here to convince me. So, I’m bringing you back for you to show me for sure that you’re not.”
“Oh… Well, why didn’t you just say that?”
“It was part of the plan. If I had told you, then you could have faked it all.”
Suddenly it seemed as if a dance off was occurring on Jack’s head as Memory and Forget seemed to have a step dancing contest. Siobahn looked back at Death, who scratched his head with his severed hand held by his other hand.
“Looks like a battle of the mind. Forget and Memory are frienemies, just like Birth and I. Sometimes we complement each other and sometimes we fight. Especially cancer patients or something. Have you ever tried to wrestle a pregnant person? You’d be surprised how easy they can take you.”
“I don’t make it a habit of fighting with pregnant women.”
“Well, that’s what’s happening now. Forget and Memory do a dance off but it’s always Irish step dancing because that’s how they make him remember or forget, by kicking him in the head and whatnot.”
“So, you’re taking me to the forest to make sure that I’m not Jack Frost?”
“Well, you thought you were Jack Frost last time because when you did your ‘act of power’ the wind blew coincidentally and you thought it was you. We’re going to do it again today.”
“Oh, okay then…”
Memory did a lovely roundhouse kick to Forget and she flew off of Jack’s head.
Death gave Memory a thumbs up and he bowed.

Jack and Siobahn made it into the small stretch of woods and Siobahn gasped at the lovely woman standing there. She was old but not at the same time with long white hair and a golden crown.
“Death, don’t you have work to do?” she asked.
“I have four minutes.” He said.
“You must be Mother Nature.” Siobahn said.
“Please, just call me Mother.” She looked at Jack and frowned. “Is that him?”
“Yes.”
“He looks almost human now…” She glided over to Siobahn and Jack as he looked everywhere but at her. “He can’t see us…”
“Yeah, I figured that out.”
“Who are you talking to?” Jack asked.
“Oh, Mother Nature.”
Jack nodded and rolled his eyes at her ‘corny’ sayings.
Mother looked at Jack and touched his face, him not feeling a thing.
“Oh, my poor boy… Bring Winter out and make everything stop.”
Siobahn didn’t know what she meant by that but these very large men came out and were dragging someone on the ground. He looked up and Siobahn saw he looked like an older version of Jack but with white eyes and a white so white it was iridescent.
“This is Winter, Jack Frost’s older brother. He is the one who made Jack Frost a human. He is also the one who provided a strange chemical makeup that allowed those doctors to make Jack human. He is dating Jealous and so it caused him to act in very unprofessional way.”
“Oh… How can you help Jack?”
“Quite simple but I needed you here because there are some things that need to be stated.”
“Alright…”
“You are in love with Jack Frost, are you not?”
“Uh… well, kind of…”
“I am afraid that when Jack Frost remembers himself, you will no longer remember him. All traces of his existence as a human will be erased.”
“But- but that’s not fair!”
Mother walked over to her and touched her face lovingly.
“Falling in love with a figment is never fair, my sweet.”
“Will… will he remember me?”
“Yes, unfortunately. All of us remember the humans we encounter and cannot forget. Forget doesn’t work on us because that is not how God created her. Mother Nature does not forget how to grow, Time does not forget how to tick, Death does not forget how to take; the list goes on.”
“Oh… I see…”
“But, you will help us get Jack Frost back to normal and we thought it would only be fair to you if we did it in a way you would both enjoy.”
“HELLO?! What the hell is going on?!” Jack yelled, only hearing Siobahn talking to nothing and just standing there.
“Pipe down, Jack.” Siobahn growled. “How am I supposed to help? I’m just a human…”
“But you mean very much to Jack Frost. Imagination is here to help make him be a personification again, a figment of your memory. Something you imaged.”
“I see…”
Imagination, who was a glowing incandescent form, walked over to Siobahn and touched her lips.
“They have given you the power to turn him back with the counter serum that my elements made. You must kiss him to turn him back. This is my gift to you, Siobahn Downing.”
“It won’t come off right?”
“No.” Mother said with a smile.
Siobahn nodded and walked over to Jack, who had begun walking away.

Jack was wondering how in the world he got mixed up with this crazy girl. If he was supposed to show her he wasn’t Jack Frost, then shouldn’t she at least give him the chance to do so? He heard someone wading through the grass and looked behind him as Siobahn walked up to him. He crossed his arms and glared at her.
“I’m really confused and I don’t know why you keep talking to yourself like a loony. There’s no one out here-“
Siobahn pulled him down to her level and kissed him with all the passion in her heart. Everything she knew she wouldn’t remember was put into that kiss, making it forceful but worth everything.
Jack suddenly remembered everything and images began to appear in front of him. He was also beginning to get his hair and eye color back to before. He was also turning lighter, seeing as how he was naturally the color of alabaster. When he remembered Siobahn, he kissed her back, not wanting to let her go for fear that the magic would be lost.
But Siobahn needed to breathe and so he pulled away from him and opened her eyes. She gasped, not seeing him in his true form before. He was much, much taller and looked a little older, wiser and experienced. He wasn’t as lanky as he seemed as a human and the small bruises he had left on her arms proved that he was strong.
“Wow… So… this is the real you?”
“Yes, this is me.”
Siobahn smiled. “You’re right… You do have a coolness about you.”
Jack Frost smiled and looked up at his friends.
“Mother.”
“Hello, Jack Frost. I’m sorry but it’s time to get back to work.” She extended her hand. “There are many things that have been waiting for you. After all, you are very important.”
Jack Frost nodded but looked at Siobahn.
“May I…”
Mother Nature sighed but smiled.
“Don’t dawdle.”
Jack nodded and everyone but Death left.
Siobahn looked up at him.
“So… what’s going to happen now?”
“I will take you back to your room to say goodbye, where you will fall asleep and wake up, thinking his is a dream.”
“I see.”
“Hey, um,” Jack Frost turned as Death held up his hand. “Would you mind?”
Jack Frost rolled his eyes.

Siobahn walked to her office quickly, Jack Frost in tow. In a hurry to get things done and over with (and trying not to let him see her crying), she closed the door on him. But, since he was back in his personification form, he turned into a cold breeze and seeped under the door, reforming. Siobahn gasped, not expecting him to do that.
“How-“
“Part of the territory. After all, I am a cool breeze.”
“Oh…”
They stood awkwardly for a moment and he sighed.
“Siobahn… please don’t make this harder than it has to be.”
“Because I’ll forget and it’ll all just be a dream?” she snapped.
The word stung Jack Frost more than he thought it would.
“Because I’ll remember.” He said softly.
Siobahn realized that it would be more painful for him than her and walked over to him, putting her arms around him.
“I hope I have a slight memory of you, Jack. Er, Jack Frost. Sorry.”
He put his hand under her chin and looked into her eyes, knowing this would be the last time she’d see him this way.
“You, in all the world, are the only one privileged to have my permission to call me just Jack.”
He kissed her with all the pain of goodbye.