The Bridge by Rachel Lou

exhausting some days, nothing more difficult than raising a hand other days. Maybe he was growing into his Bridge Master role.
    “Don’t overestimate your abilities. You aren’t a trained Bridge Master yet.”
    “Even before Mr. Pendley came, I knew my limits.”
    “Did you know your limits when you overcast on Tuesday?”
    That had been when he passed out in the dojang. “I knew my limits. I wasn’t expecting a backlash.”
    Everett stored the mop in the shower and brushed his fingers against a spiderweb. He withdrew his hand quickly and cut it on the edge of the shower door.
    He shoved his finger in his mouth and blinked back prickly tears.
    His grandfather brought him over to the sink and ran the cut under water. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
    “I’m not upset. I just don’t like it when you assume I don’t know myself. I do. I know my limits. I choose to go close to them for the sake of getting what I want. Sometimes the outcome is worth the risk.”
    “What could you possibly want that puts your life in danger?” His grandfather stuck a bandage over the cut.
    “To sate my curiosity. I was born a witch. I don’t want to ignore my abilities. I want to use all the gifts I was born with.”
    “Your father said something similar a long time ago. Your mother too. Those two were peas in a pod.”
    “That’s why they’re still married.”
    Concern flooded his grandfather’s face. “Everett….”
    He looked at his bandage. “They’re dead, I know. We’ve gone over this.”
    An idea suddenly came to mind. Bridge Masters could travel to the spirit realm. If his parents truly were dead, they’d be there.
    Of course, he knew nothing about how bridging really worked or the energy it required. He imagined it would take up all his energy and more to simply cross the bridge. Maintaining himself in the spirit world could be another story. And bridging to the correct afterlife? Just bridging to the afterlife alone was a breach of witching ethics.
    “We should head home. It is getting late and we still need to eat dinner,” his grandfather said.
    On the way to the employee section of the public parking structure, Buzz dropped on Everett’s head.
    “Grandpa, can you see this?” Everett petted Buzz’s cap.
    “See what?”
    “There’s a spirit on my head right now. It’s been following me since yesterday. I named it Buzz.”
    His grandfather stared hard at Buzz. “I can’t see anything.”
    “Do I need to expose it to you?”
    “I’m not well versed on familiar laws, but that might be the case.”
    Everett stopped in the middle of the aisle. “I have a familiar?”
    “When you were a child, your parents told me of a spirit that had introduced itself as your familiar. Only certain witches receive familiars—Bridge Masters among them.”
    Buzz vibrated against his head.
    “I have a jellyfish for a familiar?”
    “A jellyfish?” His grandfather coughed to mask a laugh. “You have a jellyfish for a familiar?”
    “I thought familiars were more… traditional”—like a cat or a raven—“and of larger, epic proportions.”
    Buzz zapped Everett.
    “Ouch! I’m sorry, but you’re not what I had in mind.”
    Buzz rocketed in front of them and blew up in size until it covered both ends of the aisle, its tentacles draped over cars like the aisle was its chair, and the cars its armrest.
    Everett’s grandfather froze, eyes huge with childlike awe and shock. “I see it now.”
    Buzz pointed a human-sized tentacle at Everett. It opened its bulbous eye to glare.
    “Don’t judge by size.” His grandfather’s voice was faint with wonder.
    “I won’t make that mistake again,” Everett said.
    Buzz shrank to its previous size and happily swam to rest on Everett’s head.
    “You waited until now to show yourself to me?” Everett poked Buzz’s cap.
    “It must have waited for your aura to develop,” Everett’s grandfather said, rubbing Buzz’s cap.
    But a jellyfish familiar? Why’d it have