Creating a Life of Trends and Make-Believe

I set my eyes upon a trivial, ornate wooden shack. From first impressions, the place looked inviting and harmless; dainty white lights trailed their way around the hut-like structure, making it stand out amongst the unadorned tree. Under these lights numerous dream catchers were placed. They blew gently in the slight breeze, and I couldn’t get over how many were there. However, dream catchers weren’t the only thing surrounding the house- various strangely shaped tokens and statues were bundled around the door. I presumed they were some sort of lucky tokens, or representative of something. It all seemed very mystical. But the thing that gave me an edgy, tense feeling was the conspicuous symbols messily smeared onto the wood. Judging by the way they were painted, the person must have been rushed. Whatever they meant, they couldn’t have been good. Another wave of shivers danced their way down my spine, causing a spooked feeling to linger over me. What have I got myself into?

Apprehension built up inside me as I took caution to the wind, and made my way over to the shack. The situation made me doubt how sane I really was. This place looked truly abnormal, and I really wasn’t sure about what I was doing. But the voice in the back of my head reminding how much I wanted Vic back pushed me towards the cabin. My hand traced the worn wood of the rail alongside of the steps, as I trod up them with extreme caution. Admittedly, I was scared. Here I was, stood in the middle of nowhere, staring at a wooden hut covered in spiritual warnings and strange symbols. Nervously, I brought my hand up to the door enveloped in trinkets and knocked as softly as I could. To be honest, I didn’t know what to expect, and when the door did open, I didn’t know what to think.

In front of me stood an extremely pretty girl, who was probably in her early twenties. Bleach blonde hair fell down to her shoulders in a straightened style, with an individual braid being tousled amongst the hair. She had a silver nose ring, and piercing blue eyes. God, her eyes were so blue. They stared straight into mine, and I felt slightly intimidated by them until she erupted into a fit of giggles. This brought a smile to my face, and made me feel at ease a lot more. Just as I was about to say something, her clothes caught my eye. They were as equally eccentric as the small timber house she lived in. An extremely colourful tie dye t-shirt hugged her small frame, and yellow and blue patterned legging travelled down her legs, stopping at her orange converse shoes. Familiar charms on bracelets coated most of her right forearm, and a small symbolic tattoo resided on her left arm.

“Hello? Sorry, you seemed to have zoned out! I’m Jenna.”
Her broad Australian accent broke through my staring daze, and quickly darted my eyes up to hers.
“Erm, yeah. Sorry! I’m Kellin!” I tried to match her bubbly personality, and gave her my best smile, to which she beamed back her own.
“Come on in, Kellin! I’m sure you’re here for a good reason!” Jenna eagerly ushered me in, stopping to look around outside for a brief moment before following after me.

The first thing that struck me was the smell of ginger and apples. It wafted its way through the small room, and I inhaled deeply, hoping to get a better smell. Around me lay more symbols and totems, accompanied with colourful furniture and fairy lights. The atmosphere in the room made me feel giddy- no wonder she seemed so happy.

“Kellin! Do you want tea?” Jenna gestured to the teapot that was now in her hands.
“Hmm, please. I’ve never tried tea. First time for everything, huh?”
“You’ve been missing out. Please, take a seat!” The Australian girl led me to a few giant cushions on the floor, with a miniature oak table placed in the middle.

She walked off, mumbling incoherent babble as she went about making the tea. Undeniably, she was a tad strange, nice nonetheless. Whilst I had some thinking time, I tried to formulate a way of saying what I wanted. Surely I would sound crazy if I just put it bluntly- “Hey! You know, I read about you in this old-as-fuck book I found in some old ass library in Michigan… feel like helping my rescue my undead boyfriend from hell?”

Yeah, I definitely won’t be putting it like that.

Jenna returned with the tea, and I mumbled a thank you under my breath. My gaze stayed on the cup in my hands. How do I start this? I had already decided my blunt approach would end badly, so it was time for me to trip over my own words.

“So Kellin, what brought you here? Hardly anyone knows about this place…” Those pure blue eyes watched me, eagerness and curiosity lingering in them.

“Errmm… Well, I was in one of the old libraries in my hometown, and this book started talking about your house thing… ermm and it sounded like you could help me.” I mentally slapped myself. Seriously, house thing?! Way to offend her, Kellin. Yet she didn’t look offended, she laughed!

“Well, you’re lucky you actually found my ‘house thing’, most people get lost along the way…”

Her face went cold and steely for a moment, indicating that the people probably never made it home. This didn’t seem to faze her for that long; she was soon smiling again.

“Well, Kellin, you seem like you’re one of those people who can’t get their words out. So you’re going to have to trust me with what I’m about to do. Don’t worry!” With that, Jenna grabbed my temples with her petite hands, and a strange euphoric, yet pressured feeling entered my head. Physically, I couldn’t move- I tried to lift my arms up, but they just stayed at my sides. The pressurised feeling reached a point where it started to hurt, then the mental grasp Jenna had on me dissipated.

Dizziness overwhelmed me, and I fell back into the pillows with a slight thud. My new found ‘friend’ simply laughed and reached for my necklace with Vic’s eternity ring on.

“N-no. Wait. What did you do?!” My attempt at being angry failed rather outstandingly, as my voice broke half way through. Jenna let out a small laugh, and continued to fumble with the small piece of jewellery wrapped around my neck.

“I transferred your thoughts into my mind, simple! You’ve got yourself into a bit of a predicament, haven’t you Kells? You’re dealing with dark stuff here… yeah, quite dark. Oh, whatever you do, do not lose this. It’s important, not only sentimentally, but you won’t be seeing Vic again if you misplace it.” The tie-dye clad girl gave me a serious look, something that didn’t suit her.

Wait, what? Transferring thoughts?! Since when was that even possible? I ran my fingers through my hair, trying to get a grasp on what just happened. Something about not losing Vic’s eternity ring? Pulses from my heart echoed around in my head and I couldn’t focus on anything- my head was still swimming from the whole thought-transferring thing.

“Drink your tea; it’ll make you feel better. Promise!” Jenna practically shoved the cup in my hand, and I reluctantly drank the tea, despite it making me feel more aware, and less dizzy. Smiling gently at Jenna was my way of saying thank you, and once again, she beamed back at me.

“Right, I know you’re wondering. Long story short- I’m a sort of witch, to you. I can do spells and all that shit that goes with it. That’s all you need to know, and we’ll leave at that. You’re a pretty cool dude, Kellin, but the less you know about me, the better. Now, let’s talk about Vic.” God this girl talks too fast, and changes the topic way too quickly. Ok, cool. She’s a witch. No biggie at all. That’s totally normal, and fine... I didn’t even know magic was real…. I was quickly torn out of my thoughts when Jenna started demising a plan.

“You, my dear Kellin need a book. It’s fucking old… and hard to find. ‘Amaranto Brujería’- that’s what it’s called. Unfortunately, it’s all written in Spanish, so it may prove difficult to come across. I haven’t seen it in a good hundred years. You have a difficult time ahead of you. The chances of you seeing Vic are pretty slim, but not impossible. It’s gonna take time Kellin, ok?”
“Yeah. I don’t care what it takes. I’m desperate to see him.”

Jenna shot me a sympathetic look, and sighed before grabbing hold of my necklace.

“This connects you to Vic. You wonder how he you could see him at your gig, don’t you? Well, Vic has a source to latch his energy onto, since the ring belonged to him for so long. The bond was strong enough to make him visible to you for a few seconds. I think that I can amplify that, so you could to talk to him for about a minute? But you gotta be quick, ok? It really takes it out of me.”

The dainty girl didn’t give me a chance to answer; instead, she got up and rummaged around in a small cabinet. After about a minute of clattering, she returned with a transparent glass ball. Was this a famous crystal ball that everyone talks about? Gingerly, she placed it out in front of us. Both of Jenna’s hands hovered over the mystical device whilst she chanted a string of intricate words in what seemed an ancient language. Slowly, the crystal ball let off a mellow white glow. I stared into, completely dumbfounded and intrigued. For some reason, I felt the need to put my hands onto the charmed item, and I felt myself fall into an empty white void.

Hesitantly, I looked around at my surroundings. There was nothing but pure white. Every direction I turned in looked the same. I started to panic, so I decided to turn around, hoping to find a door or something I could escape through. However, something much better greeted me, as I turned around. There, in front of me stood Vic. My Vic.

“V-Vic?! Is that you?!” I swear my eyes nearly popped out of my head.
“Kellin?! Oh my god. Are you real?” Vic immediately wrapped his arms around me, not waiting for an answer, and crashed his lips onto mine. They were just as soft as I remembered, and I swear I nearly collapsed. I moved my lips against his slowly, thriving off the ecstatic feeling it brought me. Vic brought his hand up and buried it in my hair, pulling me even closer, so he could kiss me harder. I smiled into the kiss, before pulling away very unwillingly. I had to make sure he knew what I was going to do-I couldn’t waste this opportunity.

“Listen, Vic. I’m going to find a way to rescue you. I-I know how, there’s this book, and Jenna is going to help me and then-“

In an instant, I was ripped away from the white void and thrown back into reality, unable to finish what I was saying to Vic. I felt my eyes tear over slightly- I had to leave Vic, again. I blinked a bit, and my blurry vision focused slightly, and I saw a drained looking Jenna staring back at me, a slight smile resting on her face. I leapt over and embraced her in my arms. She looked like she could do with a hug, and honestly, I could too.

“Thank you so much” I whispered into her ear.
“Don’t worry Kellin, we’ll get Vic back. I promise you that.