The Book Of Secrets Long Begotten

I

"JAAAAAAKE... JAAAAAAKE... WAAAKE UP JAAAAAAKE... I HAAVE A QUEEEEST FOR YOUUUU..."

Jake Collins woke up. His alarm screaming at him as if it were the end of the world. Was it? It could be.

He was 27 years old and throughout his entire life as a kid, he had heard a voice. A single solitary female voice that told him to wake up because she had a quest for him.

He had dismissed it as his overreacting imagination. His mind would be hyped up on adrenaline and send forth thoughts that sometimes sounded like voices that could blend in and out of his dreams. Perhaps this, too, was a voice of his imagination. But it didn't seem like that. It seemed real.

His father had told him that he was a smart kid and that smart kids had special minds. That was all.

Jake loved his father. Jake loved his entire family but his father was very special to him. There was something about his father that screamed I HAVE A STORY TO TELL. There seemed to be no one else that could love anyone else more than Jake's father loved Jake.

His father had always been there for him and his sister whenever their mother had to work late at the nursing home. Whenever she came home, Jake could just sense the old lives that had clung to her that entire shift.

Jake one time asked his mother if anyone had ever died when she was around them. His mother looked him straight in the eyes and spoke to him.

"Yes, death is something us nurses have to be ready for at all times. See, these folks have been around for so long. Some fought in second World War, some worked at oil rigs until their hands were as black as the night sky. Everyday I have to be alert when things like that happen." She had told him.

Jake looked around his room, sitting there on the edge of his bed, still trying to wake up. He noticed his room was normal. Normal as in nothing had changed. Everything was as he had left it.

He got up and stretched, his body becoming more at ease with the rest of himself. He rubbed his eyes with his knuckles and by then he had fully come to life.

He walked to the bathroom to take a nice warm shower and then he put his clothes on. His outfit being a plain white tee under a checkered dress shirt. His hair was nicely combed and gelled. His jeans had no frays in them. And he wore a necklace with an ID attached to it which showed his job occupation. He worked at the movie store.

He walked on down to the kitchen to make himself some breakfast. He sat down after pouring him some Cheerios and ate them in silence.

He started reminiscing a certain morning he had had when he was younger. He was probably about 12 or so.

It was the morning his favorite teacher, Mr. Erling, taught him about shadow dreaming. It was the day that changed his life forever. And as he ate more of his cereal, he began to drift off into that memory. And soon he heard his father's voice.

"Good morning Jake, how did you sleep?" He asked him. He was holding the newspaper but nothing interesting was really on it. So he put it down.

"Alright, I guess." Jake shrugged. His father looked at him in surprise.

"You guess? C'mon Jake, you are 12 years old. You cannot be guessing. You have to know. Very soon, you will have to make up your mind on certain topics and whatnot. So, did you sleep alright, son?" He asked Jake encouragingly. Finally, Jake gave in.