Kingdom Keepers: Once Upon a Dream

Chapter 2

A/N: Time to start meeting the Keepers! Are you ready?

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Finn Whitman was shelving art supplies in the rec center where he worked. He ran the desk at the kids club, where parents could drop off their kids to hang out and do crafts and things while they went to the pool or to play sports. It had been fairly quiet so far in the week since he'd started, with all the local schools still in session until the end of the month. He'd get a few kids too young for school, and a couple stragglers after school, but not much more than that. His days, for the meantime, were completely uneventful.

He wasn't complaining: less visitors meant less work for him. After a tiring semester, quiet work days were just what the doctor ordered. Quiet shifts meant uncomplicated shifts, which meant no problems for him to deal with after words, which meant he got to go home and relax with potato chips and Netflix all the sooner.

Finn was your average twenty year old, just having completed his sophomore year at a local school, studying business. He had an average family-two parents and a little sister- average friends, and an average everyday routine. A week ago, when the semester had ended, he'd gotten the job at the rec center to save up for a car. Life was good as far as he was concerned, simply because there was nothing to really make life all that bad. He'd never had anything to complain about.

Lately though, he'd had the strangest feeling that something was missing. This had been bothering him, because he'd never really felt it before. Sure he'd never been all that popular, but he'd never been un-liked at school either, and it didn't bother him. He was content with his life. But suddenly, nights spent watching whatever the latest comedy was after a run around the high school track weren't satisfying. Even when he was out with his best friend, who was the only close friend he'd ever really felt he needed, something wasn't right.

The only problem was, he didn't know what it was that was missing. The kids getting drunk at school every weekend didn't intrigue him, but what he was doing wasn't cutting it either. None of the girls at school caught his attention, and he wasn't in desperate wanting of a relationship either. He'd had one girlfriend in high-school, Sally Ringwald, and it had never even approached anything close to serious. He didn't actively want anything that he didn't have, but still, the feeling nagged at him...you need something.

His Mom would say he needed a girlfriend. His Dad would say he needed more friends. His little sister Katie would say that he needed to get out of the house and stop being, in her words, "such a loser," But none of that seemed right to him. He had no idea what could possibly make him stop feeling so...boring.

As he continued to slide paint bottles into plastic drawers, the bell above the door rang, signaling the entrance of a new customer. He turned to see two girls, a little younger than him, entering the center. He rolled his eyes; he dealt with this a lot, last summer too: teenagers wanting to come in just for the joke of it.

"Hey girls sorry," he said, pretending he wasn't annoyed. "We have an age limit of eleven for the activities,"

Despite this, one of the girls approached the desk, a ridiculous grin on her face.

"I can't believe it's you!" she squealed.

"Excuse me?" Finn asked.

"You're just....exactly how I always pictured you, and nothing like I pictured you all at the same time! This is incredible, Hi!"

The girl's voice only raised in pitch as she went on, and she edged closer and closer to him. Finn, now officially concerned, reached over to have his hand on the office phone, ready to call security.