Chapter 3
We
ended up in North Park later that afternoon,
and there was none of the drama that seemed to be common place whenever Angel,
Bret, and I were together. We had driven
down in Angel’s new car, and the drive down was delayed by the fact that we had
to stop at Bret’s place to get him dry clothes. I had gotten him pretty good earlier and he
still hadn’t dried completely. The drive
down was uneventful, and Angel seemed to behave behind the wheel, at least for
a while. That didn’t actually convince
me that her father’s apparent concern about her getting angry while behind the
wheel of a car was misplaced. I figured
it was only a matter of time before she got involved in some kind of
altercation.
We
arrived in North Park around mid-afternoon,
and the neighborhood was quite busy, even for the second day of a three day
weekend. The amount of people waking the
streets were more than I had ever seen when there wasn’t some kind of event
going on, and the parking situation was worse than it normally was. It took a good fifteen minutes to find a
place to park. Angel ended up parking a
good three streets over from our destination forcing us to have to walk up University Ave
passing all of the coffee shops and various other stores that that lined the
street. It would have been a great time
to hang out if we weren’t already preoccupied.
Debra
had a psychic reading business located on 30th about halfway between
University and Upas. The house was a
modest one story place with a small lawn, and it was pretty easy to miss by
most normal people if they were looking for it.
For us, it was more than noticeable due to the amount of arcane energy
swirling around the place. The house was
painted white with black trim with a simple black and white sign advertising
her business. It looked the same as it
did when I first found my way here back in September, after I had first
discovered the magic. Then I was scared
to death because I had killed a person the night before. Of course, I had left that first meeting with
Debra even more confused than I was when I had arrived. Needless to say that Debra, at first, didn’t
inspire a lot of confidence, but she later in her own unique way became
instrumental in me understanding the magic.
We
didn’t knock before walking inside, but a bell had announced our presence. She came out from the back shortly
afterwards. As usual, Debra was quite
beautiful. This was even true while
wearing just black sweatpants and a white shirt. Like my mother, she looked a lot younger than
her silver colored hair would initially suggest. Even while wearing no makeup, her skin was
flawless and quite tan. However, the tan
didn’t look like she had spent too much time in a tanning bed as did some of
the politicians I had seen on TV as of late.
It was a totally natural.
“It’s
about time,” she said. “I thought you
were going to keep me waiting all day.”
I should have known better than to think she would start with a polite
hello.
“It’s
all her fault,” Bret said pointing at me.
I just loved how my boyfriend threw me under the bus, but I couldn’t
argue with him. Debra probably knew the
truth anyway, and I had learned very quickly not to try to keep anything from
her.
“Why
is that not surprising?” Debra asked.
She didn’t wait for an answer. “Come
on back.”
She
led us to the kitchen, which, like the living room, was immaculate. It was also a lot more modern then I would
have expected, considering how old the house was. All the appliances looked to be brand
new. We all sat down at a square table
that was in the center of the kitchen, each one of us sitting at one of the
four sides.
“I
still can’t believe that you are a psychic,” Angel said when we were all
situated.
“Why
is that?” Debra asked.
“Well,” Angel said tentatively. “For starters, don’t all psychics have
crystal balls? And this place is way too
normal. I expected it to be dark,
foreboding, and smelling like incense.”
This, of course got a bad reaction from the rest of us. Bret just shook his head, Jamey visibly
rolled her eyes in disgust, and I shot Angel and evil glance. On the other hand, Debra just sat there
smiling in amusement. It probably was
not the first, or the last, time someone had said something like that to her.
“You watch too many cartoons,” Debra said. “Besides, I’m sure Bret wouldn’t agree.”
The moment she said his name, Bret
looked up, and man, he was having a tough time.
He looked sick. The color had
totally left his face, and he looked as is he was having trouble
breathing. It was weird because he was
perfectly fine before we had gotten here.
It was probably the worst I had ever seen him.
“You okay?” I asked him, but all he
did was nod in response.
“He will be fine,” Debra said. “He’s not use to being around this much
arcane energy. If you remember, his
reaction is similar to your own the first time you used the magic.” I remembered that very well, and I didn’t
think it was a feeling I was ever going to forget.
“Who cares?” Angel asked
annoyed. “I want proof that she can read
minds.”
“Wow,” Jamey said. “Jealous much?
You’re just mad you don’t have that sixth sense the rest of us have.”
“Why? So I can end up looking like that?” Angel
said pointing at my other half. “I think
I’m doing just fine with only five senses like normal people.”
Debra, again, just smiled. Obviously, she wasn’t bothered by Angel’s
brand of humor. Of course, she had dealt
with me in my more annoying moments, so I was sure dealing with Angel was not
much of a challenge.
“So, how about that proof?” Angel
asked not letting up for a minute.
“You know,” Jamey said with a hint
of exasperation. “I don’t think that is
very wise.” I had to agree with her,
which was quickly becoming common place.
There wasn’t anything good that could come out of it. I was sure of it, but Angel was her usual
stubborn self, and I was perfectly willing to let the cards fall where they
may. I did not think Debra would
actually accept Angel’s challenge. Debra
had warned me previously against using the magic just to prove to someone it
could be done, and there wasn’t any reason to believe she would have a change
of heart about it.
“Fine,” Debra said, proving me
wrong. “This is what I’ll do. To make things fair, I’ll do it for each of
you.” That was an interesting concept,
and because of it, I had a suspicion Angel wasn’t going to like what she had to
say.
“I’ll start with Bret.” Debra paused to consider her words and then
said. “You have strong confidence in
yourself that very frequently crosses the line into arrogance. You might want to work on that.”
Bret took that rather well, but not
because he had thick skin, which he does.
It was more because he had heard it before. I had a tendency to be cruel sometimes.
“Well
that was enlightening,” Angel deadpanned.
However,
Debra ignored her and continued on. “But
it’s funny because the one thing you do best, and love the most, is the one
thing you are not arrogant about. You
don’t believe your own hype and as a result, stay grounded in reality at least
as far as this is concerned. That will
turn out to be a good thing because you also are kind of a perfectionist, and
you are always willing to make yourself better.
As long as you stay true to your own abilities, you will be very
successful. Don’t worry about your dad. He will come around eventually.”
Bret
was looked a little shocked at what she had said, but I would liked to have
thought he was reassured in his decision to make himself available for the
baseball draft. It was a decision only I
knew about, as we had talked about it a lot over the last few months. Bret’s dad could sometimes be even more of a
hard ass then my mother, so I guess Bret was happy with what Debra had just
said. I, however, raised an eyebrow at
what she didn’t tell him. She had
implied to me in the past that because of him, I wouldn’t exactly have a lot of
privacy later on in life. I had never
told him this, even though he had asked, but the fact that she didn’t say
anything about it then was confusing. I
couldn’t really say it was because she thought I had told him. It was clear to me that wasn’t the case. She knew I had not done anything of the
sort. As a matter of fact, I was
guessing she knew he had asked me exactly that after the two of them had met,
but I never did answer him.
Debra
turned to me. “Val, I know the most
about you from experience, and some of this I’ve told you before. Your one goal will be put on hold for a
while, or you will always be working towards it, but it will take a little
longer to get where you really want to be.
That you already know, so I really don’t have a lot to tell you.”
That
was true. She did tell me a lot of
things when I saw her during the winter.
I wasn’t really expecting her to tell me anything I hadn’t heard from
her before. However, I was sure she knew
more than what she was actually telling me, but I wasn’t sure why she had
decided to keep quiet. If there was one
thing I could say about Debra was she was not long winded. Short and sweet seemed to work very well for
her.
“Sometimes,
the magic changes,” she continued. “Or
it might seem like it changes, but there is a better explanation. Remember I said magic is natural and is
totally depended upon the user. That
means as the user changes, the magic usually changes with it. Of course, you have experience in this. You learned early on all is not exactly as it
appears when it comes to magic, and just today you learned something new, the
ability to change the flow of time for a person. It’s an interesting ability and one, even
though I had heard of it, I had never seen.
You might have your work cut out for you, so good luck.” At this, Angel’s eyes grew wide. She had gotten the proof that she seemed so
bad to want.
“And
Angel,” Debra said moving on to the one who started all of this. This could get really ugly. She didn’t have contact with Angel, and I
haven’t really told her much, so it would be interesting to hear what she would
came up with. She continued, “You have the unfortunate ability of being a bitch
and being right at the same time.”
Bret,
understandably winced, while Jamey mouthed a silent, “Wow,” after that blunt
statement.
“But
if I’m right then it doesn’t matter,” Angel said effectively missing the
point.
“But
it does matter,” Debra countered. “You
can be right all day long, but who would listen? People don’t usually listen to jackasses,
regardless of accuracy of the substance of what is said.”
That
caused snickers from the rest of us, but Angel took it surprisingly well. She was actually considering what Debra had
said. Maybe sometimes Bret and I did not
give her as much credit as she deserved.
This was one of the few times she actually surprised us by not reacting
badly to negative things that were said about her.
Debra
turned and looked at Jamey, and from the look on Jamey’s face, she was
preparing herself for the worse.
Considering two out of the three of us were not exactly given complimentary
marks, I really could not blame her. However, Debra cracked a genuine smile,
something she did not often do.
“Now,
the reason why I called you all here in the first place was basically because
of Jamey.” Debra turned and regarded her
rather intensely. “You have some
personal issues to work out. I won’t go
into details here because I’m quite sure you know what I’m referring to, and
I’m not sure what everyone else knows. It
is for you to decided what you do, or don’t, want them to know. Just remember that until you accept who you
are, don’t expect anyone else to. Now
despite all this, you seem to be popular as of late.”
“Who? Me?” Jamey asked ignoring the first part of
what Debra had said. I had a suspicion
she knew what Debra meant, and except for the latter part, had expected everything
Debra had said. That being said, she wasn’t one who was use to
being in the spotlight. “How’s that?”
Debra
didn’t respond right away. She just sat
there with her eyes closed for what seemed like a long time. I could feel the shift in the arcane energy
in the room, the feeling as if something had changed, and if I could feel it,
then I knew Bret and Jamey could also.
Bret grabbed my arm and started to say something, but a look from me
stopped him. I didn’t want anyone to say
anything to break Debra’s focus as that could cause disastrous results,
especially since we did not have any clue as to what she was doing in the first
place. Whatever she was doing was, at
least for her, not a normal use of the magic. She instead was doing what I understood was
outside of her capabilities. On the ring
finger of her right hand was a ring that more resemble on of those mood rings I
use to wear as a young girl than an actual piece of jewelry, and even though
from outward appearances nothing about the ring suggested anything out of the
ordinary, I was sure it was the key to what was happening. The ring was her focus point, something used
to cast spells that she probably wouldn’t have been able to do otherwise. This went on for so long even I was starting
to become impatient, but she finally opened her eyes.
“It
might be easier if I showed you,” she said.
“And
how do you plan on doing that?” Angel said fulfilling her role as the skeptic
of the group.
“Here
I thought you were going to ask me something difficult,” Debra answered. “Easy.
Just walk out into the living room and you will have the answer that you
seek. However, there is one
condition. There is to be no talking. Any sound from the four of you will break the
spell.”
“You
mean you’re not coming with us?” Bret asked.
He had gotten over what had been bothering him about the all of the
energy in the house. The peeked look had
disappeared and his heavy breathing had stopped. He was back to his normal good looking self,
even though he did look a little apprehensive.
He had always been a weary of the magic, except for when I was using it
to heal his injuries.
“Why would I do that?” Debra looked at him
like he was a moron. It was about time
she was doing that to someone else besides me, and I had also thought it was
the first time someone besides me had ever done it to him. It was good for his ego. Debra rattled on. “I already know what it is you are about to
see. I’ll just sit here and stay
comfortable.”
“What?”
Angel chided him. “Is the big crybaby
scared?”
“I
have no reason to be scared,” Bret said patiently. “I’ve had more experience with the magic then
you, and almost got hurt because of it.”
That was actually a true statement.
There was one incident where Bret had pissed me off enough where I did
use the magic on him, in a way that could have serious done some damage to his
handsome facial features. However, I did
not believed for one second he was not scared.
He actually did not like me using the magic.
“He
isn’t any more scared than you are,” Debra said. When Angel gave her a dirty look, she
continued, “What? Are you going to try
to convince me otherwise?”
Angel
had started to say something, but then thought better of it. I had guessed correctly that she had figured she
was not going to win this battle, no matter how much she tried. There was no way Angel was going to win a
battle of wits with a mind reader.
Knowing
very well she had gotten the best of Angel, Debra continued. “None of you have to go if you don’t want to. Of course that would mean I just wasted a
bunch of time and energy, and nothing would piss me off more than using magic
such as this for nothing. If you’re
going to go, then do it. This spell
won’t last forever.”
There
was not anyway I wasn’t going to go find out what was going on. I was quite curious as to what Debra had in
store for us. We were all quite
intimidated by what we were going to experience, even if we did not have a clue
as to what it was. Knowing this, I had a
feeling we would all put whatever fears we had aside and just go through with
it. The reasons for this were quite
simple. Jamey was the cause of all this
so I was sure she would go just to see what the fuss was all about. I was going just because I didn’t want this
trip down here to be a total waste of time, and as long as I was willing to go
through with it, Bret was going to go through with it as well. There was no way he was going to sit around
scared while I went on to do what he was scared to do. Bret might have been secure enough in
masculinity to have been able to have a gay best friend, had the circumstances
been different, but he wasn’t secure enough to look like a coward in front of
me. Angel would go because there was no
way she would sit here by herself.
So I
lead everyone back into the living room.
I was expecting a change in the makeup of the energy when we walked
inside, but I was disappointed. Nothing,
as far as the energy was concerned, had changed. It was the same as when Debra first cast the
spell, and our walking directly into the spell didn’t change the spell in any
way. However, the living room was quite
different then when we had first arrived.
The room was lit by the lamps on the end tables, and a glance out the
windows made it clear it was night time.
It was clear to all of us that we had walked into a scene from the not
too distant past, but as for what we were about to see, none of us hand any
clue. Angel had started to speak, but an
evil glance directed at her from Jamey made Angel clamp right up. It was no surprise to anyone that Angel would
be the first to forget the directive of not talking. We just stood by the door leading to the
kitchen in total silence and waited.
Our
wait did not last long. The front door
opened causing the familiar bell tones to ring, and through it walked a male
figure that none of us recognized. He
was tall, as tall as Bret, but nowhere near as built. As a matter of fact, he was quite skinny, and
after seeing him, I was tempted to run back into Debra’s kitchen to cook him a
good meal. One meal might not have been
enough. He would need about ten of those
to make him look at lot less sickly. His
curly blond hair fell to down a little past his shoulders, and it was in great
condition. It looked to be in better
condition than both Angel’s and Jamey’s hair and they had great hair. His clothing was rather simple. He just wore a pair of black jeans and a
plain white button down long sleeve shirt.
There was not anything significant about that except for the fact they
were both way too small for him and reinforced the appearance of him being
extremely underweight. His eyes were
blue and so intense that I was taken aback buy them. I hadn’t seen eyes like that since Caleb and
all of us, except for Jamey, knew where he ended up. The most intriguing thing about him was he
was a user. The energy about him was
unmistakable, and it was a little unsettling because I would not have thought I
would be able to feel the energy while watching a scene from the recent
past.
He
was not doing anything I would have considered suspicious but instead quietly
surveyed the room while not saying a word or touching anything. When his eyes passed over the area where we
were standing, all four of us collectively flinched. However, he continued to survey the room as
he should have without noticing the four of us.
“Is
there something I can help you with?”
Debra’s
voice had broken the silence and the guy looked in our direction. Debra appeared from the kitchen, walking
directly through Jamey, to face the man who had entered her establishment. The fact she had done it without any warning
and had walked through Jamey as if she didn’t exist had caused a little bit of
commotion between the four of us. As a matter of fact, the spell would have been
broken completely if Bret hadn’t put his hand over Angel mouth to stop her
scream from being audible.
Debra
looked almost the same as she did when we had seen her outside this
vision. However, there were two major
differences. The sweatpants she wore were
blue and the t-shirt was red. Her hair
was also put up in a bun. She looked
like a school teacher, and her style actually made her look a little more
around her proper age. She just stood
there with her hands on her hips and waited, looking even more like the pissed
off school teacher.
“I’m
looking for something,” he said. He had
a strange accent. It sounded as if it
might have been English, but there was something a little off. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. “And you’re going to help me find it.” Talk about being rude, but if he was trying
to pull off a menacing act, it was definitely working. At least, it was on me.
Debra,
however, was not impressed.
“Something? Or is it really
someone?” I was not sure if what she did
there was a wise idea. If this English,
or whatever he was, guy thought about it a little more, he would have figured
out that she could read his thoughts, and I was not so sure that was
information she wanted to give away at that point.
He
didn’t seem to care one way or the other.
“What I’m looking for will lead me to the person I seek.”
The
confused look on Debra’s face said what she thought of that. I do not remember ever seeing someone being
able to stump her like so thoroughly.
She always seemed to be on top of everything, not to mention being one
step ahead of everyone else.
“Well,
if you had read the sign out front, you would realize that I have business
hours, and it is quite late. I close at
nine in the evening. Come back tomorrow
before then.”
“I
know what time you close,” he said not making any attempt to leave. “You will help me find what I seek.” That was a demand and not a request. I was sure that would go over well. Debra was always one who loved to be told
what to do.
“And
if I don’t?”
“This
is what I seek.” He talked as if she
hadn’t said anything. He pulled out what
appeared to be some kind of necklace from around his neck. It was a black threaded type of necklace with
a green triangle shaped jewel at the end with a black border that matched the
black thread of the actual chain. It was
quite cool looking, and I vague sense of familiarity with it. A complete racking of my brain to try and
place it proved to be unsuccessful. The
semi-English men threw the necklace over to Debra, which she caught directly in
her left palm. While Debra studied the
chain, I glanced at the rest of the spectators.
Bret gave me a confused shrug, while Angel just stood there looking
amused. Jamey, on the other hand, had a
look of horrified recognition that twisted her little girl facial features into
something unrecognizable. She was
freaked.
“I
know that you’ve come into contact with one exactly like it,” he said. He held up his left hand, and the chain
floated up into mid air, out of Debra’s palm.
The chain didn’t stop moving as it moved across the room to his waiting
left hand. Once it reached him, he
returned the chain to his rightful place around his neck. “You will help me find it.”
I
wasn’t sure how he knew she had come into contact with a chain exactly like the
one he was wearing, but if he was able to trace the one he was looking for to
Debra, that meant that he should have been able to trace it to the actual
location. He should not have had to go
through Debra to find it.
“I
will do no such thing,” Debra said having figured out long ago that this guy
was up to no good and clearly had seen enough.
The
semi-Englishman just sighed in response.
“I guess I’ll just have to kill you then.” He said like it was something that he didn’t
want to do, but the twinkle in his eyes betrayed his real feelings. It was something that he relished in. There was only a flash of it, and then it was
gone, but it was something I did not miss.
“Really,”
she said. Again, Debra was not impressed.
“Do what you feel you must.” The
fact Debra was not in any way frightened by what this guy was saying, was not
lost on any of us. He was walking really
dangerous ground here and from the look on his face, it didn’t seem as if he
had realized it. The sudden, but also
very subtle, change in energy confirmed my suspicion that she was definitely up
to something. However, I couldn’t tell
what she had done. There was no visual
evidence she had done anything out of the ordinary. As a matter of fact, she stood there with her
arms folded across her chest apparently waiting.
“It
would be my pleasure,” he said. Again, the
shift in the energy was noticeable, but with the naked eye, there was no
evidence of anything happening. He just
stood there not moving. What was this,
some sort of silent magic face off? I
soon would have my answer. Out of thin
air, hundreds of small wooden spikes started to appear, the tips pointing
Debra’s direction. That meant they were
also pointing in our direction since we were crowded around behind her. They had the appearance of stakes used in
vampire movies. He didn’t waste any time
waiting for them all to show. He quickly
raised his arm in her direction, and the spikes started racing towards us, as
fast as bullets in flight. Now each of
us knew that she was not in any danger just based on the fact that she was
actually in the next room, waiting on us, but even that bit of knowledge didn’t
prepare us for what we saw.
The
spikes had hit an invisible barrier Debra had erected around herself, but they
didn’t just fall to the floor. They
didn’t even stop moving. Instead, all of
the spikes that hit the barrier immediately turned and started to head back the
direction from which they came. The
spell the guy had cast was being reflected right back at him, and every spike
that hit barrier let out enough of a visual impact to be noticeable blue
light. Debra just stood there, her arms
still folded across her chest, with an evil smirk on her face. The guy looked shocked at this turn of
events. Actually, horrified would be a
more accurate description of the facial expression he had while each spike
reflected back towards him. Then just as
quickly, all of the spikes simultaneously fell to the carpet. The spikes disappeared as they hit the floor,
leaving no trace of their existence. The
energy in the room had returned to normal, as if nothing had even
happened. The two who were just locked
in a magical battle didn’t contain their surprise, but it was the fake
Englishman who recovered first. His face
changed from total shock to total recognition.
“Melissa,”
he said with disdain. He then quickly
ran out of the front door, leaving Debra standing there looking perplexed.
“I
think you’ve all seen enough,” said present day Debra. As soon as she had spoken the first word the
spell had broken and the living room had returned to present time. The light in room came from the sunlight
shining through the living room windows as opposed to the lamps on the end
tables. She turned to Jamey and
said. “Now do you understand why I
wanted to see you?”
Jamey
nodded, but it was Angel who spoke, “No.
I don’t understand any of it. Who
the hell was that creepy skinny dude?”
Debra
again looked at Jamey. “You don’t know
who he is. Is that correct?”
“I’ve
never seen that guy before in my life.”
“But
you do know the location of what he is looking for.” It was statement of fact and not a question.
“Of
course,” Jamey said. “You knew that
already.”
“Well,
we didn’t,” Angel said. “Where is it?”
“It’s
where it always was,” Jamey answered.
She pulled from under her shirt and around her neck and exact copy of
the chain that the fake Englishman was looking for. “I’ve worn it every day since my mother had
given it to me when I was twelve.”