Halley Wolffer

Chapter 1

Halley Wolffer and the Alchemy Crystal

A Fantasy Story by Sheila Wisz Ellayn

It was a cold and snowy day at Surrey Hills, the wind was taking away the last fallen leaves, it was already getting dark and a sad, lonely girl was walking across a park somewhere in a town not far from London...

"I hate my life!" the girl said, kicking a rock as she walked beside a frosty tree- "Really, one of these days I should leave the Doorsleys and never come back!"

The girl was shivering and cursing, as her light, worn-out brown coat was unable to protect her from the wind. Her purple gloves were full of holes as well, and her curly, waist-long brown hair was seriously tangled and already catching snowflakes.

"What do they need all of these for, anyway?" she said, taking a look inside the large paper bag that she was carrying- "Sending me to get glue, nails and chains in this awful weather..."

The girl's phone started to ring all of a sudden with some metal goth music, and when she answered the call looking frustrated, an angry voice began yelling furiously at her:

"Halley, where the hell are you?" a woman screamed, kitchen sounds and other voices yelling in the background- "We have a lot of work to do for tomorrow, and you have to get home this very moment!"

"I know, I had to wait in the line for twenty minutes!"

"Whatever, just hurry up!"

Halley closed her phone, she sighed with a profound despair and then, still shivering and whispering curses to the wind, she began to walk faster and soon she arrived at a lonely street somewhere in the outskirts of the town.

"I wish that I could have a new life, somewhere else, another life in a different world..." Halley whispered, her hazel eyes looking at the sky...

2-

The door was blasted open before Halley could reach the knob, she gasped in surprise and then a huge, creepy-looking man with red hair grabbed and pulled her with unnecessary force into the house.

"You go and start carving the pumpkins, girl!"

"Yeah, whatever... what do you need all of these for?" Halley asked as she handed over the bag, not surprised at all by the rather rude treatment- "It's freezing out there!"

The man, however, did not pay any attention to her. He got the glue bottle from the bag, and then, grunting all the time, he began to glue a variety of Halloween decorations (little witches, bats, vampires, cardboard pumpkins and other similar things) to the wooden walls all over the living room.

Halley took a look around realizing that the Halloween lights were shining already, almost everything was ready for the party the following day and then a woman's voice came from the kitchen:

"Halley, carve the stupid pumpkins right away!"

"Coming, Aunt Cecelia..."

Halley Wolffer had never met her parents. She had been adopted by her father's younger sister when she was a few months old, and when she grew up, they told her that her mom and dad had died in a terrible car crash.

The Doorsleys had taken care of Halley for sixteen long and difficult years, but even though they provided for her, the atypical family had never accepted the orphan as a daughter. Cecelia and Vermont would always concentrate all of their affection on their natural daughter, regarding Halley as a waste of food and space.

Halley had been a disaster for the family, she was a disaster at school as well and she had no friends at all, a disaster girl that felt like she was living in the wrong world...