Power of Words

Chapter 2: And So It Starts

      It was just a normal day, like any other. Cliché, I know, but it was. I mean, really! I walked down the street, listening to Imagine Dragons in one ear and early morning traffic in the other. I turned right sharply before turning to an ATM.

      Withdrawing a couple twenties, I walked at a brisk pace to the coffee shop down the road. The bell tinkled above me as I walked through the glass door. I immediately walked up to the counter and ordered cafe mocha and a couple biscotti. Then, collecting my mocha, biscotti and the change from my bill, I walked over to an empty table by a window.

     I sipped at my coffee and took a nibble from one of the biscotti sticks. I moaned in delight as the flavors hit my tongue. I looked around the coffee shop, searching for something or someone to catch my attention. People watching. A great thing to do when nothing else was available.

      I glanced up at the counter, set up almost like a bar counter with its high stools and higher counter that came to almost chest height whenever I ordered something. Sitting on the far end of the shop was a boy, much like any other, his hooves resting on the little foot-rest of the stool. Wait, hooves? Since when did boys have.... he's not human. I gave the boy a careful look-over.

      Hooves that were followed by slightly hairy legs than normal. He wore pants--thank goodness for that! -- and a t-shirt. His face was, oddly enough, perfectly normal--well, human, I guess if you wanted to be specific. His elbows rested on the counter and in his left hand was a little orb of light. What on earth was that? My face betrayed my confusion--and the fact that I was openly staring, apparently. So... he was a goat-boy?

     "Fawn, actually." a voice said in my head. My head swiveled around to face the seat across from me. Someone was sitting there. I didn't know when they had gotten there. Not that it would have been too hard, what with me boring my eyes into Mr. Hoof-foot over there. I blinked at the woman that sat across from me.

     "What?" she said out loud. Wait. So it wasn't in my head.

      Ugh, I need to get more sleep. First goat-boy, now I'm being snuck up on! I should notice these things. What? Am I going around with blinders on? I looked again at the woman sitting across from me. She was shimmering. SHIMMERING! Yep. Blinders. A shimmering woman and a goat-boy. What have I been doing? Ignoring all this stuff?

      "Oh, so you don't know what's going on, then!" she exclaimed, as though she were surprised.

      "What give you that idea?" I said sarcastically.

      "Well, your face, frankly. And the fact that you're staring at Jesse."

      "Jesse?" I asked.

      "What? Did you not expect him to have a name? This isn't Narnia! We don't go around calling each other names like 'Mrs. Beaver' or 'Mr. Fawn.'"

      "What the heck is going on here?!" I raised my voice.

     "There's no need to shout." she said quietly, laying a hand on mine, "What do you think is going on, dear?" She looked around twenty, but this woman had the voice of a mature adult. And a British one, at that.

      Some accent you've got there, girly. I thought.

      "I think," I mocked her accent. "That I've gone mad. Off the rocker."

      "Very funny, no need to poke fun."

      "No, seriously." I said normally, "I think I've gone crazy. I mean, this can't possibly be real."

      "Believe it, darling. Come back tomorrow and you'll probably find more of us."

       "Us?"

      "Yes. What? Did you think I was like you? Can't you see the dust?"

       "That shimmery stuff?"

       She rolled her eyes at me, "Yes. That shimmery stuff."

      "So, he's a fawn--" shimmer girl glared at me, "Okay, pardon me, Jesse is a fawn." Shimmer nodded. "So then, what are you?"

      "A faerie." she said seriously.

      I looked at her in all her shimmery dust-ness. Faerie?

     "I thought faeries had wings?"

      Shimmer-girl huffed and puffed at that, "Yes and all humans are dark skinned, I presume?"

      I sighed, "Point taken."

      "And that um... the ball of light with, er, Jesse. What is...?”

       "She? Pixie. Aura-belle or Aura for short."

      "Okay. So, then assuming I believe all this, erm...information." I fumbled for the right word, "Does that mean that everything else is real too? Dragons and... and..."

     "Yeah, fire-eaters, snotty princesses and princes that always get their way, you name it. All those tragic poster-child stories like the kids in Africa? Yeah, it’s not just the kids in Africa... Those are just the ones that get the most attention." 

      "Wait, what? So it's not just a bunch of fantasy crap?"

      "Crap? Excuse me?"

     "Well, so-rry" I said giving her sass that little-miss-British didn't want to put up with.

     "To answer your question, no. It's not just a bunch of stuff." she explained, "All that stuff from, well, anything from Star Trek to Harry Potter. All that fan-fiction stuff that you humans love to write? It's here, girl."

     "So, like, Anakin Skywalker and Edward Cullen are out there somewhere?"

     "Yeah, you've got it."

     And the horrors continued, because that wasn't all that was out there. Everything from evil villains to Mary Sues. MARY SUES! Bella Swan, here I come!