Inkslingin' Chris

               Shannon sat on her blanket, carefully placing the candles in a pentagram shape, while a duck across the pond dove under the water, searching for food.  It was Saturday morning, and all night she had lay awake, thinking about Sean, not wanting to dream the dreams, but still haunted by the nightmare of it all.  She had asked her mother about the dreams, she was a self-professed psychic after all, but her mother had shrugged her off, more interested in her television show than her daughter.  Internet searches had given her a little information, but still she couldn’t explain the nagging dread, or the realism of them.  She tried hard daily to escape from the clutches of the most vivid ones, but always there was the same horrific gasping, and the feeling that something or someone was wrong.  She almost always woke weeping, not necessarily crying, but sad nevertheless.  She has spent most of last night determined to do something about it, and some of it getting ready to start.

                She had carefully wrapped the dagger, it had been a gift, and placed it into her knapsack, accompanied by five red candles, and an ashtray.  She leafed through an old book of hers and removed some of the flowers that she had been drying for an occasion such as this.  She would need some other spices, and hoped that her mothers supply in the cabinet was all right, and she placed them into the pouch.  Then she grabbed Sean’s notebook.  She had stolen it from him in History class the other day while he had been sleeping.  He seemed to notice for a minute, but shrugged it off, something else had been bothering him, and he was scribbling in that notebook of his.  Then she grabbed her book of spells, a blanket, and had set off towards the pond, whistling cheerfully, convinced that the protection spell she was going to cast for him would help.  Unsure of the consequences she was going to have to face, but willing to do something at least, after all, Sean seemed to be unaware or even uncaring of his fate.   She thought about what it was she was doing.  She wasn’t necessarily a practicing witch; she had just grown up around the occult.  Her mother had belonged to a coven of Wicca for as long as she could remember, and it was just a matter of repetition that she even knew what she knew. 

                Shannon lit the rose petals at the bottom of the ash tray.  The candles, blowing gently in the breeze, gave a faint scent, and she smiled.  She unrolled the dagger from its velvet wrap, and placed it at her knees.  Again she looked across the pond, and for a moment she thought she saw Sean looking at her, but then noticed it was just the glint off a window.  She opened the book and looked again at the spell.  She had stolen the book from her mother’s library, and it was easily older than her mother, the dust between the pages giving ff the scent of something dead.  She was to wrap up a belonging of his with string, and while reciting the chant, drip a bit of her own blood into the cauldron (in this case an ashtray, she wasn’t as fancy as the witches you might imagine) and then sprinkle the sage and anise on top sealing the deal so to speak.  She breathed a deep sigh, glanced around again to make sure no one was looking at her and picked up the dagger.  Her mind was racing, and she focused her thoughts on Sean, and his protection.

                The car had pulled up slowly, so slow Shannon almost never even saw it moving, and had she not looked across the pond so many times, she might not have noticed it at all.  It was dusty, like it had come from the country, a massive hulk of a car.  She squinted to get a better look, this vehicle was one that she had never seen, and it stopped.  It was a house down from Sean’s house, but she knew what the man inside the car was looking at.  Then suddenly she could see him, his eyes were sharp, and he looked at her with a grin on his face.  She wasn’t sure that he could see her, but it appeared as though he was looking right at her.  She saw Sean out of the corner of her eye dart out the door, picking his bike up off the lawn.

‘You’d better be careful little girl,’

                The voice had sounded so clear, as if the speaker was right next to her, and a shudder flew down her spine.  She knew the voice, could feel the voice, and she was suddenly horrified.

‘do you know what it is your messing with?’

She turned to look again at the car, suddenly realizing that it was a Buick, and the man was there, a wicked little laugh snarling off his lips.  He dropped his cigarette out the window, and started the car, Shannon was grasping quickly for the dagger, and she knew that the spell had to be cast.  She could hear his thoughts, and shook her head to clear them.  She had opened herself to the spirits, and just maybe, had let the wrong one in.  The car drove off, honking at a kid who was chasing a ball into the street, and she cut into her wrist.  She could see the blood dripping over the rose petals, and she rocked as she chanted.  She quickly finished the spell, unsure now that she was doing it correctly, and started to repack her things.  It was time for her to go, soon her mother would be wondering why she wasn’t doing the chores, but it wasn’t even the whipping she would get for not working that concerned her.  Somehow he could talk to her.  She didn’t know if she could talk back, but one thing was for sure, she didn’t like the sound of that voice.