I call it a short story, but...
Anyway. This story has been rated 12+ for language. Please read at your own discretion.
I wrote this a few months ago, then randomly picked it up again and finished parts two through four. It's not as bad as it could have been.
Enjoy.
~Part I
It had gone out.
In all of Bair’s life, she had never thought she’d see such a terrible sight. She’d seen demons, goblins, hencemen, vampires, werewolves, dark wizards and witches, rabid dupers--even nightmares swirling about--but never had anything been more terrifying or ugly than this.
The candle had gone out.
At first she couldn’t believe it. Such a thing couldn’t be happening. The candle really didn’t go out. There was no way possible, no way at all. She had wrapped her fingers around the waxy stem of the candle, her eyes growing wide, her heart jumping between her throat and the pit of her stomach, making her nauseous in its rapid race. The fear spiraled in like darkness, hot and burning, fast and terrifying. At first she didn’t know what to do. But when she thought she needed help, only one face came to her mind.
“Mistia.” It was a whisper, even though she had wanted to scream it. She tried again, this time using her pounding heart to aid her cry. “MISTIA!”
Her usually strong, nonchalant, uncaring attitude was long forgotten, hidden on a dusty shelf in some library. A new kind of emotion and personality overtook her, as quick as a stolen kiss, something unpreventable, incurable, and, in a twisted sense, almost enjoyable.
Bair’s next thought was to relight the candle. Perhaps it would still work. Though she could hear the teacher’s words ringing loud in her head, contradicting her actions, she refused to believe it. She completely refused.
She spotted two rocks on the forest floor and struck them desperately, all the while repeatedly calling the name of her dearest friend. As she found hardship in her journey of lighting the rocks, a new name touched her lips; “EMMY!” Rather than waiting for any response, she hit the rocks together as hard as she could. She could feel the vibrations of the rocks ringing in her hands, shaking and nearly breaking her arms. A spark. Smack. A flame.
She immediately guided the flame to the candle, her eyes large as they soaked up the scene like a beggar child would eat a feast. The flame danced on the candlestick deceivingly for a moment, then fell, releasing the candle and evaporating into thin air.
Bair closed her eyes in devastation and terror. The entire world stopped, taking a deep, shaking breath with her. It was completely silent. The crickets who usually sang their songs annoyingly all night had fallen respectfully silent, the wind had stopped whirling. For a few minutes, the world let Bair alone. Bair felt oddly comforted by the silence, which is why she screamed when she suddenly heard a voice behind her, so she hurriedly spun to meet whomever it was.
Mistia. Her curled hair was a bit tangled, with leaves and bark clinging to it. Her purple eyes cut through the scene, barely making out Bair’s figure in the moonlit night. The forest trees cowered together, but the moon peaked his head over them in order to watch the scene below.
“Bair?” Mistia repeated, approaching her. “What happened? Why are you crying?”
Bair hadn’t noticed her tears until then. She wiped them bitterly away with the back of her hand, and suddenly found herself unsure if she could even speak.
Mistia peered over her and saw the candlestick. Her breath caught.
“B-… Bair, whose flame was that?” she stuttered.
No answer.
“Bairbre!” Bair looked up to meet Mistia’s eyes. It was clear that Mistia believed she had it all worked out. “How . . . how could you?”
“Mistia,” she croaked, but before she could say more her best friend had swung at her, fury shining in her eyes.
“HOW DARE YOU?” Bair dodged her second blow as she kicked dirt at her, her anger overtaking her. “HOW DARE YOU? AFTER ALL HE DID FOR YOU! After . . .” She shook her head, stepping away. “AND YOU JUST KILL HIM!”
Bair stood up immediately. She had found her personality, and it snapped back far too quickly. “I didn’t mean to! I didn’t want to!”
“But you did, didn’t you?” Mistia looked past her at the candlestick, and then ran to it, sitting down next to it and wrapping her fingers around it, pulling it close to her heart. By now, tears were augmenting her face as well, and Bair’s heart stung with such intensity that she sat down, her back facing Mistia and the candlestick, crying silently but painfully.
“Maybe . . .” Bair dared, and then took a deep, shaking breath in order to continue. “Maybe he’s not gone yet.”
“He’s gone, Bair.” Her tears and anger shook her voice like a leaf in a hurricane. “They said that if . . . if the candle went out when he was still in his animal form . . .”
“He’d be trapped,” Bair finished softly, not believing the words that were coming out of her mouth.
“And his soul would die.” Mistia’s voice was harsh to Bair, so she cowered and covered her ears. “HIS SOUL WOULD DIE.”
Bair spun around glaring, daring to be brave, daring to have hope. “But his soul wouldn’t die immediately! I’m sure he’s fine, just out there, somewhere, and he’ll come to us, and we’ll help him--”
“By the time he finds us, it’ll be too late.” Her voice was too broken to hold emotion--it only seemed to be lifelessly repeating the rules and books she had read. “He’s gone, Bair. He’s gone.”
Bair held her sides as she wept, for she knew her friend was right. Mistia rose from the spot and was gone herself, taking flight as quickly on her feet as she did in her animal form. Her friendship and love for Bair seemed to be long forgotten as she darted between the trees, leaving her sobbing friend alone in the pitch black night.
~Part II
Bars had taken her out of her shack about twenty minutes ago. They sat on a bench in broad daylight, Bars with one arm around her shoulders and the other around her waist, resting his chin on her shoulder. She sat there unemotionally, staring stoically ahead, her light green eyes lost behind thick glasses she hated wearing. Her makeup wasn’t done, her hair was in a messy bun, and despite the ninety-five degree weather, she sat in a black jacket and shorts. She didn’t respond to Bars’ touches, kisses, or hugs. She refused to listen to his words. The only time she moved her head was when she caught side of Mistia.
Among the sea of students, Mistia had always stood out--at least to Bair. Perhaps it was some sort of aura, some light around her. She never was completely sure. Mistia walked up, staring not at Bair but at her clingy boyfriend, and stopped right in front of the pair.
She sucked in a deep breath as she looked at the redhead. Bars slowly glanced up with a nonchalant face, and mumbled an almost sleepy, “What?”
“You should be ashamed,” she said with a shaking voice. Without acknowledging her best friend since childhood, she turned and stomped off, slinging her black messenger bag over her shoulder as she went.
Bair pulled out of Bars’ hot grasp, and he jumped in surprise. As she turned to watch him, he looked almost pleased with himself. Bair didn’t respond to his look, only Mistia’s words. “What’s on your mind?”
“She speaks!” He rose his hands as if praising some unseen entity. “There is a god!”
“What’s on your mind?” she repeated.
He put his hands back to his sides, very naturally slipping them into his jean pockets. “Beg pardon?”
Bair grinded her teeth, anger suddenly spiking through her. “I said, what the hell’s on your mind?”
“Now now, you know my rule about cursing.” Bair opened her mouth, perhaps to show him what cursing really was, but he suddenly laughed, “What’s supposed to be on my mind?”
“Mistia.”
“I’m--is this a trick?”
“Mistia can read minds, jackass. What’re you thinking about?”
He shook his head, chuckling slightly at his thoughts.
Bair sat up a little straighter as she prepared for confrontation. “Look, I don’t know what you find so hilarious. Perhaps my best friend’s death? Because honestly, I see nothing funny here, unless you’re a lot sicker than I thought.”
He seemed to bring down his noncaring attitude, but only a little. “No. Fredrick’s death was terrible.”
“Then what the hell’s so funny?”
“You.”
“What?” She spat the word at him.
“You’re hilarious!” He laughed again. “You know it, you are! Sitting here moaning and sobbing Fredrick’s death like you two were the best of friends, like you never threatened death on him. Like you two never argued, never fought. Like you both lived in a happy world of sunshine and dandelions.” Bair looked fit to kill a human being, until he added, with another burst of laughter, “Like you loved him!”
“Bastard!” she screeched, so loud that many nearby students stopped their walking. She smacked him across the face, then stood up and retreated from him back into her shack, ignoring his screams of apology.
~Part III
He came to her in her dreams. He was so gorgeous, and Bair felt bad for never noticing. His light brown hair and eyes were almost heavenly with his pale skin. She laughed in a sickly manner, remembered how she used to tease him about his pale skin, as hers was so tan. “You read too much!” she remembered crying, as she dangled his book just out of his reach. “Maybe if you stopped reading and came to the beach with us, you’d actually have some color in that skin.”
He was wearing a white flannel shirt and jeans, the same thing he had been wearing when she last saw him. His arms were outstretched, and she ran to him, grasping him, sobbing, pulling him closer.
“Bair,” he whispered gently. She cried harder. She had missed his voice so terribly, had needed it to survive. She never knew how much he meant until he died.
“You’re dead,” she breathed, pulling away to look into his eyes. “You’re dead, and it’s my fault.”
“I’m not dead.” He held her head in his hands, wiping away her tears with his thumbs. “This is projection, not a dream. I’m projecting to you.”
She grabbed his wrists as if she was grabbing hope. “Where are you?”
“Here.” He took out a piece of paper from his jeans and slipped it into her pocket. Bair noticed she was wearing jeans and a tank top, the last thing he had seen her dressed in. “Look in those jeans, it’ll be there. Come to me now. Don’t wait a minute. Go wake Alelucin, he’ll fly you.”
“Mistia!” she remembered in a shaking breath. “I need to wake her up.”
“It’ll take too much time.” He was starting to fade from her dream, growing transparent. She desperately grasped his disappearing face. “Take the spell book in your room. Top shelf, next to your assignment books. I put it up there in the hope you’ll read it.”
“Do I need anything else? Are you hurt?”
“Just bring the spell book. I’ll tell you more when you get here.” By now he was nearly gone, and said on his last breath, “Just hurry!”
He was gone, as if he had never existed. Bair jolted awake, looked around in the dark night. To assure it was really not a dream and a projection, she rushed to the left corner of her room, where she carelessly piled her dirty clothes. After sifting for a few minutes, she found her jeans, and checked her right, then left pocket, before pulling out a crumbled piece of paper.
She unfolded it and smiled, reading it through tears of joy.
~Part IV
They had left immediately, but Bair felt as if it had been too long. She nearly fell off Alelucin as she found Fredrick lying on the ground, near a tree splattered with his blood. Holding the spell book to her side, she sat down next to him and grabbed his hand.
“Freddy!” she screamed. “Freddy, can you hear me?”
He stayed still, immobile, but at her voice he squeezed her hand and opened his eyes ever so slightly. “P… page sixt… y four.”
Understanding immediately, she flung the book on the ground and flipped. Her hands shook, and Fredrick squeezed the hand he had once again to assure her. She smiled thankfully. After she found the page, she whispered for light, and with a snap of her fingers, her right hand lit up. She held it over the book and read the spell, her lips moving as her eyes ran over the words. When she was done she shined her light over him and tried to find his wound.
His entire shirt was splattered in blood on every side, so it was hard to see where exactly it was. He said shakily, “A… dragon… caught…”
She put her glowing hand to his mouth to quiet him, then unbuttoned his shirt. Gaping wounds were scattered around his chest, bleeding unforgivably and nauseatingly. Keeping her outward appearance calm while her insides screamed in terror, she hesitated, then placed her hand over the biggest wound, the one in the center.
She repeated the Latin words in a whisper, soothingly and gently. Bair never knew herself to be anything but harsh and brash, but the new side of her personality helped her through the process.
After repeating the words many times, running her hands over his sides, Fredrick sat up. He ran his free hand over his body, as if to confirm, and nodded, grinning. “You did it, Bair.”
It hadn’t soaked up the blood, however, so Bair looked doubtful. But at his laugh, she felt comforted, and helped him stand. The moment he was on his feet, he embraced her, and she started to cry.
He released her, alarmed. “Are you hurt?”
“I… Freddy…” She hadn’t notice him grab her hands after their hug, but when she looked down, she saw his hands holding lovingly to hers. “I thought… you were…”
“I’m not.” He smiled and looked her in the eyes. “It was a freak accident, is all. A dragon flew by and grabbed me. I went unconscious, turned back into a human, and my candle went out. It wasn’t your fault. I’m fine.”
“Freddy--…” She didn’t know what it was, but something inside told her she had to say it. Her heart immediately jumped, as if threatening her, and she sucked in a deep breath, feeling as if her whole life was weighing on these three simple words. “Freddy…. I…”
“I love you too.”
Surprised, she looked up, taken back by his sudden honesty. Grinning, he pulled her in and kissed her passionately, taking the incentive he never had before the accident. She enjoyed herself, then pushed away as the surprise sunk in.
“What?” Fredrick seemed worried for a split moment, until she broke into a gorgeous smile.
“How’d you know?”
“Oh, please. I’m not stupid.”
She rolled her eyes thickly, finding her personality once again. “Oh, no, of course not, Mr. I’m-Top-of-the-Class.”
“At least I’m not wearing glasses thicker than windshield wipers.”
She playfully but brutally punched him in his arm, and he laughed, pulling her to his side as they walked towards Alelucin. Without words, they mounted him and beckoned him into the sky, holding on to one another tightly, forgetting the spell book they no longer needed.
The night was gorgeous, shimmering, dark but bright. The stars screamed out annoyingly at every angle, brightening up the dark blue sky, and the moon hung crescent in the air, watching Bair and Fredrick as if waiting.
She turned in her seat to face him. “I really do, you know.” She spoke slowly and softly.
“What?”
“It’s true.”
“What’s true?” He was now grinning.
She realized what he was doing, and glared. “Shut up!” She turned back to the front, but he turned her around again.
“Come on, Bair. Say it.”
She down at her hands, fumbling with the edge of her jacket, then slowly back up to him. “I love you.”
He smiled kindly. “You sound like the sap you’ve always hated.”
She nodded admittedly, a smiling barely brushing her face. “This would be the movie I’d never watch, the book I’d never buy.”
“Mhm.”
Then, suddenly, making up her mind, “But I don’t care.”
And in the freezing cold of the night, the silent, frigid, unforgiving air, the two kissed a second time. This time it was Bair’s choice, because she knew she truly loved him and only him, and no matter what the world said, she would never let him go.
