The Life Of A Magician

August 12 2015

I'm a magician. Yeah. I know. Holy crap. I received all three transcripts. At first I thought it was just some idiot messing around. There's a lot of those. But the more I thought about it (very dangerous for me. Or so I've been told), it became more real. Which is why I snuck out with my best sword, some protein bars, and bottled water.
Wait. I'm getting too far ahead. First things first. I'm Maxwell Filtwater. Call me Max. Unless you want to know what it's like to have your fingers crushed by a smithy hammer. If so, please, call me Maxwell. Anyway, I live in Ottawa, Canada. Well, in suburbia really. I have curly blonde hair and blue eyes. In my driveway is a full on forge. It's sacred to me. I've put my life into it. I may only be thirteen but it's honestly the only thing in my life that's stayed. My mom's first husband (my sister's dad) gone. My dad (mom's second husband) killed in the Army. Mom, never actually there after dads death. My sister, moved out. Friends, they come and go as they please.
My best stress reliever is pounding some metal into art. And the cash I get from that art. $65-80 for a hunting knife of any kind. $90-100 for a sword. See the website for more at filt'shiltsandblades.com.* I loved that place. Until I left.
I wouldn't call my mom strict, just over protective. No going out after eight. Stay in the neighborhood. If is has wheels on, have a helmet on. Don't get hurt in hockey (yes I play hockey. I'm from Ottawa, what'd ya expect?) so on. I tend to not have parties or go to them because mom's not in the mood. I live a fairly boring life. Which is sort of why I snuck out.
When I got the transcripts I hid them from mom. I knew she'd take them. She doesn't like it when I get stuff in the mail from someone she doesn't know. I listened to them on my own. When I opened my locker the next day, which, what a coincidence, has the same combo as the transcript, I found a djed in it. That's when I knew. I just had to figure out how to get there.
So all of yesterday, I spent the day subtlety packing for a trip. Tearing down the website. Finishing orders for extra money. Packing some food and water. At midnight I wrote a quick note telling mom I'll tell her what's up when I arrived at made my run.
I took my rollerblades out of the garage and put them on. I choses theses because they are just as fast as a bike and twice as portable. I checked my bag one last time. $300. Check. My masterpiece. Check. Protein bars. Check. Water. Check. Greyhound ticket. Check. I was set. I skated down the street to the nearest station. One hour. Perfect time. I got on the bus as loading was ending. Half hour we left and started heading toward the lakes. On hour. 2:30 I had about five hours before mom noticed.
We made it to the border at 8:00. The driver called for passports. Shit. I didn't remember seeing my passport. I asked th driver to get off and look in my bag. Luckily, he let me. I dug through one pocket. Nothing. Next one. Nothing. At the last pocket I was sweating. I looked in and right on top was everything I needed. Printed letter and signature( just ask your mom to sign the bottom of a page with a lie of why then type the letter and have it printed) passport. Good.
I breathed a sigh of relief as I got back on. A guard came on the bus to check passports and ask questions.
"Passport." the guy said. I handed it to him. "Letter." I gave that to him too. "Where are you coming from." he said not looking away from the paper.
"Ottawa," I said back.
"Where are you going."
"Brooklyn."
"Why."
"Seeing my dad." He glanced at me, expressionless. That bugged me. That same way he wasn't asking, but commanding. Freaking Americans.
He shoved the passport and paper back at me and walked off without a word. Asshat. Half an hour later we were moving again. By then I'm sure my mom noticed I was gone. Another few hours of driving and I could see New York in the distance. Just a few miles out of Brooklyn we broke down. It looked like only 2 or 3 miles away so I grabbed my pack, put on my rollerblades and started on my way. There was a small patch of woods to my left after a few miles. I was nearly in the city by then.
I heard a rustling in a shrub. I stopped, telling myself it was nothing, but my instincts said otherwise. I stopped. I squinted art the bush, trying to see what it was. Suddenly something jumped out at me. I felt a jaw sink into my right shoulder. And just like that it was gone. I didn't know what it was our how bad it was, all I knew was that hurt.
I lost my balance and crashed to the ground. My vision blurred for second. Once it cleared I tried to get to my feet. After two tries I finally found my balance. I got out of there as quickly as I could. In five minutes my shirt was soaked and I was in the city. It was about 8:00 PM. I took out an extra shirt and made a makeshift bandage out of it. I had a feeling that I would need to wake people up so I bought a megaphone before I got to bloody. Again. I looked around for any sign of the warehouse. I skated around following my instincts. Like I said, it's dangerous for me to think. Just do and figure it out later. That strategy worked again. As the bandage bloodied I found the mansion. I sat down to rest.
"Son of a-" I muttered a few curses I shouldn't repeat.
When I finished I signed and braced. I sounded off the siren on the megaphone. Saying it was loud is a complete and utter understatement. Pressed the call button and started speaking.
"Yoo-hoo! If anyone up there can hear this, I just want you to know I'm dying. Yea. So if someone could come down here and maybe save me that would be nice. Hello? Hello!? HELLO!? Really?,"
I sounded the siren again and waited few seconds.
"How do you sleep throughout that? Serio-" I started coughing and hacked up some blood. That got some feedback from the megaphone.
"Oh. Would you look at that. I coughed up some blood. How fun was that? Not really, can someone come out here? Please?"
A blonde girl about my age came rushing out.
"Thanks," I said through the megaphone. My vision started going black. The last thing I remember was her saying "You'll live. Don't worry. You'll live."

*filt'shiltsandblades.com doesn't exist. Sorry for the disappointment.