Where The Mind Is With Fear

Part 7

In entered Abigail, Aarya's best friend from the orphanage. Aarya should have been surprised, but all she did was utter a squeaky oh-i-am-so-delighted sound and run to hug Abigail. Me, on the other hand, the more rationalist one, just sat there on the couch, staring at the family.

"Welcome, welcome to my mansion, Mr. and Mrs. Fox. Make yourself at home!", Mrs.Russo cheery voice filled the silence. "By the looks of it, you already know each other?", she continued.

"Oh yes, Aarya was my best friend in the orphanage!", said Abigail.

"Wait, I'm confused. You go to an orphanage, you have frigging parents and you visit people at ten in the night.",I chimed in, recovering my senses.

"Whoa, that's a whole lot of questions!", Mr.Fox, who had been quiet the whole time, sounded like a literal frog. His voice was so croaky and ribbit-y!

Mrs. Fox answered me. "The orphanage is just an excuse we make so that Alford and I can do all our secretive magic work in the house and also so that Abigail can keep an eye on the human world. And, yes, it is our custom in the magic world that guests who arrive before eight at night are considered rude. Ten is the ideal timing." Haha. This magic and stuff was really hilarious.

"Why don't you show Abigail around, sweety?", Mrs.Russo asked Aarya.

"Sure". And off they went, hand in hand, not realizing that I existed. I lazily walked towards my room and saw them already there. Abigail Fox gave me a friendly but brief hug and scampered off to where Aarya was taking out her new toys on the bed. Nine year olds, I say. Hmph.

"Why don't you join us?", Abigail suddenly asked in her baby voice, batting her pretty eyelashes that marked the boundaries of her deep brown eyes.

"No, I'm fine. This book will keep me immersed.", I waved my favourite book, The Kite Runner, at her and she just turned around, making her blonde hair go whoosh!

"For you, a thousand times over.", the book read. How I loved Khaled Hosseini, it wasn't even funny.  Hehe that rhymed. My eyes drifted to where Aarya was perched on the window sill, and Abigail was sitting cross-legged on the floor. As hard as I tried, I couldn't help feeling a little jealous that Aarya ignored me the way she did now. I mean, I know sounds silly but except for me, no one had ever spent so much time with her. Neither had she loved anyone besides me, nor did they return it back. Since our stay here, she shared her love between me and Mrs.Russo already. And now Abigail. 

Someone knocked the door and in came a boy. He was approximately fourteen, tall and thin, with gelled hair. He wore a  formal shirt with a coat and tie, and denim jeans which coincided perfectly with his sexy converse.

"Hey, bro.", said Abigail in a casual tone. Unlike Abigail, he noticed both of us, Aarya and me, and waved a hand.

"Hey. You must be Courtney and the girl sitting there is Aarya."

"Yes, hi. You are Abigail's brother?", I asked.

"Yeah. I'm sorry I came a little late. I had some errands to do. My mother must've already told you.", he asked questioningly.

"Well no, but it's alright.", Aarya responded and got back to whatever she was doing with Abigail.

Not knowing what to talk, I asked,"So what's your name?"

"I'm Seth.", he replied.

"Cool", I replied lamely. And before I knew it, we were talking as if we knew each other since ages and although I'm pretty much shy of the opposite sex, he made me feel very comfortable. Mostly, it was because we both liked the same things. Well, almost. We both liked football(Liverpool all the way), Jose Manuel Reina was our God, and we could just not live without music. Oh, he liked Backstreet Boys and Yellowcard, too. His favourite color was also black and we both liked eating Belgium Dark Chocolate with popcorn, as gross as it sounds, while watching a football game. Too much of coincidence. I thought I was the only retard who ate such combos. He was also very funny, way funnier than Yo Mama jokes.

At one point, I'd said, "WHAT will I ever do without football", and he'd said "eat?", in such a  way that it was tough not to laugh at his innocence. We talked till one, when FizzFire came in, asking us to assemble downstairs for dinner. My throat was already dry with all the talking and I suddenly felt like I hadn't eaten in days. Dinner was going to be fun with Seth, I thought. And I was right. Dinner was fun. I got to know so many interesting things about Mrs.Russo and her magic. 

Seth and me were hogging our food and Mrs.Fox was in the kitchen, chatting away with Mrs.Russo(she was only surveying the work of the hagons, not cooking) while Mr.Fox was showing some magic trick to Aarya and Abigail. "My daddy is wonderful!", Abigail said. I could feel the distant look in Aarya's eyes as she wondered about her dad. Her expressions quickly recovered and she giggled.

"So, I heard you were the new desire?", Seth suddenly asked. WHY DOES EVERYONE KEEP SAYING THAT?

"I have no clue, Seth. What does it even mean?",I retorted.

"Well, it means you are her heir as she is ol-"

"Ya, I know that story. Tell me the real part of it".

"THAT is the real part. Good that you know." Mrs. Russo and Mrs.Fox returned from the kitchen, followed by three hagons who were heavily loaded with more tempting dishes. All of us were now seated and we hogged more.

"So, Seth, I heard you were kicked out of your wizardry school?", Mrs.Russo embarrassed Seth so much! I hated this habit of hers. She would always bring up topics like this in front of her guests so that she would seem more superior in front of them. I knew it from my two-month stay in her mansion. 

Seth went red in the face, while I just looked down and munched on the tortilla chips. As every parent would do, even Mrs.Fox stood up for her son.

"Oh, and I heard you killed one of His Majesty's hagons? And that your most faithful dragon-teacher ran away?", Mrs.Fox's raspy voice said.

What?! Askook ran away? Who was His Majesty? Seth brightened up a little, while it was Mrs.Russo's chance to redden now. Seth looked at my confused expression and whispered,"His Majesty is our God, and to kill His hagons is a sin as bad as killing the Lord himself. Not that it would be possible."

"Oh. Which dragon of Russo's ran away?".

"I don't know for sure, but a dragon named Askook flew to another master day before at night, because it seemed that he had met a girl who inspired him and helped him differentiate between good and bad."

Shit. Shit. Was I the girl? Because, as far as I knew, no other 'girl' had come to the mansion. Mrs.Russo would have definitely told us. Plus, during our lessons before the day Askook flew away, I'd casually remarked how I din't like being associated with Mrs.Russo because she was nasty, and her Eradication ceremonies were even more merciless. Boy, if she got to know, she would be very furious. Askook was her most favorite and faithful dragon-teacher.

"How do you know all this, when I don't know it even though I'm the one living here?", I asked.

"It's called The Chronicles of Magic, sweetheart", Seth replied. Ignoring the way my heart raced when he called me sweetheart(I have no clue why, though), I asked,"What is that?".

"You really are an amateur. It's the local newspaper that we people read. You should know all this by now."

"Sure. Ms.Russo is very dedicated towards us.", I could not help the sarcasm in my voice. 

We finished dinner in silence, bade goodbye to the Fox family and I went upstairs with Aarya who finally saw a world beyond Abigail.

"I asked Abigail to come tomorrow, too. And don't give me that look of yours, I asked her to bring Seth along with her for you. Your welcome.", Aarya responded on receiving an evil look from me. I was sleepy and my mind blocked all the thoughts of Mrs.Russo and her killings. I would save the detective work for tomorrow. Right now, I  concentrated on sleep. 

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