Chenoa’s Spellbinder Notes (Day 5)

Species (according to Ursa):

5)               Shadows:

-      Shadows are entities made of raw power

-      There are only 2 of each type of shadow (male and female)

-      Only those who come from species that predate the “New Gods” can see them

o   Ursa says only the Quintet can see them (who or what are the Quintet?)

o   ?- what are the “new gods?”

o   ?- are their old gods?

o   ?- why can’t everyone see the shadows

-       No one knows where the shadows came from

-      ? – could those be the animal things I see out of the corner of my eye?

o   If so, why can I see them?

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School was a grateful distraction for Chenoa.  With Gabby, she didn’t have to think about Tristan.  Her face flushed every time she thought about him.  The school day was thankfully uneventful and Chenoa found time passing faster than she would have cared for.  Chris also ended up having a much better day than the one before, which Nick contributed to Chris not picking on Chenoa.

“You shouldn’t mess with her, Chris,” Nick said for the millionth time at lunch.

Chris had been watching Chenoa eat, trying to devise a trick to play on her.

“Why? Because it’s mean?” Chris snorted.

Smirking, Chris did not take his eyes off Chenoa. Nick suppressed a grimace. Sometimes Chris’s intensity towards Chenoa was just plain creepy.

“Well, yes.  And you are too old to be picking on a girl like that.  I mean if you like her why don’t you just ask her out?”

“Like her?  I don’t like her!”

“Please you stare at her more than my older brother stares at nudie magazines.”

Nick laughed and patted Chris on the back.  Chris rolled his eyes.  Everyone knew that Nick’s older brother was a borderline porno addict.  Yet there was no way Chris liked Chenoa.  There was just something about her that made him want to tease and pick on her, for some reason he wanted to make her face flush pink and her body tremble.  Stupid Chenoa with her stupid, pretty smile and stupid, kind personality.

“Chris, I’m serious.  You shouldn’t mess with her…she’s…she’s different.”

“I know that.  That’s why I mess with her.  There is something different about her and it bugs me.”

“No, I mean really different.  Dangerous different.”

“What do you mean?  Have you heard anything? Seen something?”

Snapping his head around, Chris stared intently at Nick as if he could pluck the information from Nick’s head. Recoiling slightly, Nick shook his head.

“N…no…I just can tell.”

Finally staring at his food, Chris sighed.  Nick was such a worry-wart. Yet Chris didn’t want to get in a fight with Nick.  No matter how annoying Nick could be, Nick was Chris’s best friend.  It was possible Nick had a point about Chris acting juvenile. He just couldn’t help it when it came to Chenoa.  It was like an itch he had to scratch.

As Chris thought about this, Nick stared in Chenoa’s direction, not at her but at the ground around her.  Chenoa and Gabby sat at a table next to a large window.  The sun flooded in, illuminating Gabby and Chenoa while throwing shadows on the ground, which was what Nick watched. Instead of looking like oddly shaped chairs and people, the shadows all looked like animals, whose heads were facing Chenoa.  As he observed the shadows, he remembered the first time he had seen them and how he could never stop seeing them afterwards.

Winter had been strong and cold.  Snow covered the ground and reached to mid-calf.  Nick had been on the bus as it approached Chenoa’s stop.  Chris had been complaining about Chenoa as always.

“She’s always so damn nice,” Chris had bitched. “No one can be that nice and she’s always answering questions in class.  Such a little miss know-it-all…”

Doing as he always did, Nick had nodded and smiled, occasionally agreeing.  He stared out the bus window as Chris talked, enjoying the fresh snow.  Fresh snow had always been one of Nick’s favorite things.  It was clear, crisp, and dazzling like diamonds.  As the bus approached Chenoa’s stop, he saw her struggling in her clunky boots to get through the snow to the bus stop.  That’s when Nick first saw the odd shadows.  Chenoa had tripped in the snow and was falling backward when her shadow seemed to reach up, catch her, and place her back on balance.  If that hadn’t been strange enough, her shadow looked like a black polar bear.  Rubbing his eyes, Nick had been sure he had seen it by mistake.  However, as Chenoa walked towards the bus, Nick saw that her shadow did look like a polar bear. Not only that though but the trees, fences, and anything that cast a shadow seemed to have a shadow that looked like an animal.

Then as Chenoa came closer and closer to the bus, the shadows seemed to detach themselves and follow her. Again, Nick had rubbed his eyes and tried to refocus, but the shadows were following her like lambs behind their shepherd.   For the rest of the day, Nick had done his best to convince himself that it had been his imagination.  It was not physically possible.  Yet during a lunch much like today, he saw the shadows again and knew it could not be his imagination.  He didn’t feel he was that creative and to see them more than once meant something to him.  Chenoa was different all right; he just didn’t understand how or why. 

Now as he watched her, Nick noticed that Gabby was doing the same, looking around at the floor as she ate with her best friend.  She was trying not to be obvious, but she was definitely studying the shadows on the floor.  Lifting her head, Gabby met Nick’s eyes and her face was creased with concern.  Nick knew what she was thinking.  How could this be and what did it mean?

Gabby, for her part, was more concerned about Chenoa.  Was this a good or bad thing?  Her family was Latino so they always had stories about woogy-men and demons.  She figured it was a mix of being Catholic and Latino.  Now she worried that those stories were true and, if they were, then those woogy-men were after her best friend.  But why?  

“I’m going to go throw my stuff away and grab an ice cream bar.  I feel like treating myself.  Do you want one?” Chenoa asked, breaking her friend’s thoughts.

“Huh?  What?” Gabby started from her thoughts, unsure of what Chenoa had said.

“Gabby? Are you okay?  You have been dazing off all day…I hope you didn’t catch whatever I had yesterday.”

“No…no…I’m fine.  Just a lot on my mind.”

“Okay. If you say so.  Do you want ice cream? My treat.”

“Sure…chocolate, please.”

“Of course.”

Chenoa beamed at her best friend and walked away to throw away her trash.  Gabby’s hair stood on end as the shadows seemed to get up and follow Chenoa.  It was unnatural and eerie.   Yet despite its “wrongness,” part of Gabby felt as if they were not dangerous.  The way they followed her friend almost was like pets after their owner.  If the idea had not seemed totally crazy, Gabby would have thought the shadows loved Chenoa. 

In a moment Chenoa was back and they ate their ice cream, laughing about something or other.  The shadows seemed to settle back down, and Gabby chose to let it slide from her mind. When lunch was over, Chenoa and Gabby headed to their class.   The next strange thing was that there was a note saying the class had been canceled.  Nothing more.  The whole class waited for the required twenty minutes but no one ever came.  So, the students wandered off until the next period.  Chenoa and Gabby went outside to enjoy the nice weather.  They sat in the football and track-field stands, basking in the sun. 

“Day’s almost over,” Chenoa sighed in pleasure and worry.

“You don’t sound like you are happy about that,” Gabby laughed.

“I don’t know,” Chenoa replied, sitting up and looking at her hands. “We have this house guest right now and he just makes me feel weird and awkward.”

“House guest?  Why didn’t you mention him before?”

“I was trying not to think about him.”

“Why? Is he scary?”

“No.”

“Creepy?”

“No…”

“Then what?”

“He’s just…he’s really hot.”

“You’re uncomfortable because he’s really hot?”

Gabby laughed loudly, hitting her friend in the arm.

“No, you don’t understand.  He’s like hypnotizing hot.  I don’t know. It doesn’t seem natural.  I mean when I look into his eyes, I lose all track of time and space and I just want him to hold me and…”

“Wow…Chenoa, you got it bad. Who is he?”

“Friend of my dad’s.”

“What?  He’s like old then!”

“I know!  I know and it makes my attraction to him all that much worse ‘cause he’s my dad’s friend.”

They fell silent as Chenoa blushed.  Trying to think of something positive to say, Gabby gnawed on her lower lip.

“Well, he’s just visiting so he won’t be around long and it’s normal for girls our age to be attracted to older men.  Plus, it’s just a crush.”

“Yeah, but…”

Chenoa’s face turned bright pink.

“But what?”

“I had a dream about him last night.”

“A dream?  What kind of dream?”

“A…uh…sexual one.”

It was Gabby’s turn to blush as she smacked her friend hard on the arm.  Both girls laughed uncomfortably.

“Really?  What happened?” Gabby finally managed to ask.

“I don’t remember it clearly, but it was really hot and heavy and amazing and….”

Unable to continue, Chenoa shivered in pleasure and embarrassment.  Gabby stared amazed at her friend.  To her knowledge, Chenoa had never been super sexual or even liked to talk about sex.   This visitor had to be something.

“Maybe you are soul mates!” Gabby teased to break the uncomfortable silence.

“Shut up, Gabby!  You said that yesterday about the guy from my dreams! He’s like my dad’s age, even if he looks only twenty-five.”

“Even at twenty-five, he’d be ten years older than us.  That’s gross!”

“I know! I know!  As you said it’s just a crush, but it embarrasses me, and I don’t know how long he’ll be around, and I don’t feel comfortable around him because of the dream and how hot he is.”

“You’ll be okay, Chenoa.  It’ll pass.  Once you get to know him, those feelings will fade.  Like mine for Booger Bobby did.”

Snorting to stifle her laugh, Chenoa nodded her head vigorously.  Chenoa had totally forgotten the two months that Gaby had liked Bobby Miller, better known as Booger Bobby, due to his unfortunate habit of catching horrible winter colds.  Talking to Gabby made Chenoa feel better about her attraction to Tristan.  Gabby was right.  It would pass.  However, this did not make her feel better about going home.  She loved her home, but something kept telling her Tristan was trouble and that she had to be careful. 

As Chenoa thought to herself, Gabby looked around the field.  A gentle wind teased Gabby’s cheeks as she looked over the field.  Suddenly a strange man appeared on the field.  The man was tall with a lean build.  His eyes were bright blue like two stars shining in his face.  His hair was the purest black that seemed to reflect silver under the rays of the sun.  In all honesty, the man was so perfectly handsome in every way that it almost hurt to look at him.  Meeting his eyes, Gabby had to squint to hold his brilliant gaze as if she were looking at the sun.  Smiling a bewitching smile, the man held a long finger to his lips and seemed to tell her to shush.

Then as suddenly as he appeared, the man disappeared. Blinking, Gabby thought that she truly must be going crazy. 

The rest of the school day passed quickly and, before Chenoa knew it, she was walking back home.  Matt appeared as he always did, full of questions about her day and life.  It was a welcome excuse not to go home right away. So, Matt and Chenoa talked for a long time, about nothing in particular, just conversations about books and such. When the sun started to lower in the sky, Chenoa knew she had to excuse herself.

“I must be going,” Chenoa sighed.

Her eyes flickered in the direction of her house.

“Why do you not seem happy about that?” Matt inquired with concern.

“We have a house guest right now…”

“And you don’t like him…”

Tristan’s face flashed into her mind. Matt cocked his head to the side with interest as his eyes narrowed ever so slightly.

“No.  He seems nice enough.  I don’t know…”

He’s too handsome.  I have feelings for him.  Chenoa thought in her mind.  Matt’s face turned sharp for a moment but smoothened quickly. 

“What don’t you know, Chenny?”

“He’s just different, I guess.”

Suddenly the dream flashed in her mind as Tristan had made her back arch and her mouth open in a moan.  Both Matt and Chenoa blushed furiously as Chenoa turned away from Matt.  Matt’s fists clenched as he tried to return his face to normal.  Taking a deep breath, Chenoa looked back at Matt, who had managed to get rid of all the red in his face, except for a few small patches on his cheeks. 

“I got to be going.  I’ll see you tomorrow, Matt.”

“Alright, Chenny.  Have a good night.”

Waving, Chenoa headed off to her house.