Part Ten: You Learn Something New Every Day

Finally! Drumroll.......... Part Ten!

Our story continues....

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I tried to call my Dad but there was no phone reception.

“Doesn’t Venice have cell phone tower thingys?” I asked.

“Not 1781 Venice," Apollo said.

“Not what?”

“There are no cell phones in Venice in 1781,” he explained. Although he hadn’t said the words, his tone implied the phrase ‘you moron.’

Had I somehow traveled in time again?

I scurried over to the nearest open window and looked out over a Venetian canal, crowded with narrow boats. People shuffled along the stone walkways beneath me wearing clothing that was not from 2011.

“Wait a minute,” I said to Apollo, who had now grabbed a polishing cloth from a bench and was rubbing himself down as if he were at a refreshing spa. “What year did you say this is?”

“1. 7. 8. 1,” he sang to me as an answer.

I looked out the window once more. No motorboats. No electric or phone wires. No sounds of car engines. Not one single person below me carried a cell phone or had headphones plugged into their ears. There was nothing modern in this world at all.

It looked like calling my Dad to come get me wasn’t going to be an option. I turned back and glanced around the room, hoping to see someone who might help me escape.

“Where is everyone?” I asked. “Why is this whole place empty? What are all the stone carvers doing?”

“It’s carnivale. ‘What aren’t they doing?’ is a better question,” Apollo answered playfully.

“Are you sure we’re in Venice and this isn’t just some hallucination my brain made up?” I whimpered.

“Hmmm.” Apollo studied me quizzically. Then he scooped up a heaping handful of marble dust from a nearby tabletop and blew it in my face.

Nice.

“When we get back to Cali-fornia you will still have some of that dust in your hair,” he announced matter-of-factly. “That is, unless we go bathing together.” He probably winked at me then, but I couldn’t see it. I was too busy coughing and trying to wipe the dust off my face.

“So we are going back?!” I managed to inquire eventually, in between gasps for dust-free air.

“Of course. After I find Eurydice. Do you think I want to stay in 1781 Venice forever? Do you know how badly this place can reek in the summer months? That’s not just water in those canals you know.”

“Eww. Can statues even smell things?”

“Yes. I can do anything you can do, only better.” He beamed. I rolled my eyes.

“Well, can you even bathe without sinking? You must weigh a ton.”

“Thanks for the compliment,” he said sarcastically. “I can bathe just like you, it just has to be shallow water.”

Before I started picturing him bathing, I decided to change topics.

“When I went into the painting, the room spun and it was much more dramatic. This time I just opened my eyes and here we were.”

“Is there a question in there?” Apollo eyed me. “So naïve. When you went into the painting you went into a different dimension, a different world. Each magical painting is its own world. When you travel with a statue you only shift in time, not to a different world. So there is no spinning or swirling or drama. It’s a good thing I’m so knowledgeable or you’d be out of luck.”

I didn’t feel like I was in luck.

“Okay. Not that that makes sense, but let’s pretend it does. If magical paints create a magical painting, what creates a magical statue?”

“These,” he replied as he walked over to an unrolled leather case full of tools. Most of them had wooden handles and metal blades. There were so many different shapes and sizes of implements it was mind-boggling. “These are made from materials imbued with magic. Trees, metal ores, even cattle. The magical people, which are known as lejerdemani, learned how to fuse magic to all of the elements of nature and when you use those enhanced elements to make new things, like this chisel for example, it is then able to create magical things.”

“So then anything can be magical, right? I could make a machine out of magic steel, and then use it to create magical flying cars or something?”

“Nope. It only works if human effort is involved. A sculptor has to work with his tools to create a statue. A painter uses his brushes to apply pigments to a canvas.”

“Okay. Then can a chef make magical food?” I asked.

“Yes. But what are you going to do with magical food? It really doesn’t do much other than get eaten. I suppose you can have it dance on your table or something…”

Although this was highly educational, I would have to consider the merits of magical food later. Did I want to spend the rest of my life asking Apollo questions in this room? For now I needed to get back home.

“Who is Uri-something and why do we have to find her?” I asked.

“The real Eurydice is a story for another time, but hopefully you know it,” Apollo looked at me for confirmation. I didn’t have a clue what he was talking about. He emptied his lungs with a pained sigh.

“What do they teach you children nowadays?” he asked rhetorically. “My Eurydice is another statue that was carved by my Master in this shop. I fell in love with her and I’d like to bring her back with me to Cali-fornia.”

He really couldn’t say that word without tripping on it.

“Can we actually bring things back with us?”

“Oh yes. As long as the mass of the object is not larger than the mass of you and I combined. So it’s not like we can place a hand on the Basilica San Marco and it will just join us inside the museum when we go back.”

“So where is this statue now?”

“She should be right here, where I left her!” he said excitedly.

He began shuffling from sculpture to sculpture, gazing at them briefly, looking for his love. After checking every single item in the room twice, he declared: “She’s not here.”

“Oh, well that’s too bad. You’ll have to stop by some other time. If we leave now, I’ll still be home in time for dinner,” I remarked cheerily.

“What? No way. I’m not leaving here without her. Do you know how long it has been since I came into contact with one of you? I lived without Eurydice for hundreds of years. I tried to manage, but I was so lonely. It was stupid of me not to have returned for her before when I had the opportunities. You are like an endangered species now. You’ve all gone off somewhere or died. Who knows. If we don’t get her now, I may never get the chance ever again.” His words rang with sincere desperation.

“So you are not magically strong enough to come and go through time by yourself?”

“Of course not! We need a magical person with us to do that. Do you think I’d be standing in museums all my life if I could just be running around on my own? We are only able to move when a magical person sings or hums our song.”

“Does that mean you can still see and hear things all the time though?” I asked the question before I even considered if I actually wanted to know the answer.

“Yes, of course we can.”

Oh. Creepy.

“But not all statues are magical. Just like not all paintings are magical,” he continued. “Only objects created with magical tools by a human being. So your porcelain princess figurine on your night stand is most likely not watching you in your sleep.”

Good to know. Not that I had a princess figurine….

“Is there a way to tell if something is magical?” I inquired, suddenly wondering if my antique mahogany desk that I had inherited from my mother was actually ‘alive,’ so-to-speak.

“Yes, you concentrate your mind on that object and a song pops into your head. You automatically hum it like the idiot you are and then it will come to life before your eyes. Then you can tell you’ve found one.”

I rewarded his frank answer with an uneasy half-smile.

“But don’t worry,” he continued. “Most magical objects have not survived the tests of time. Paintings and sculptures are treasured art objects though, so in a way we are immortal. If you don’t eat magical food it will eventually rot and smell pretty bad. But you can stare at a beautiful marble sculpture forever. I never spoil.”

He threw another smile my way and gracefully motioned toward himself.

Even though Apollo was full of himself, he was answering all of my questions and telling me a lot of things I hadn’t known. I felt like I needed to return the favor. Although he wasn’t going to give me much of a choice, I decided to help him find Uri-dee-cee.

Stay tuned for Part Eleven!!!

Thank you for reading my story everyone!

Part Nine: The Gods Must Be Crazy

Yeah, we are slow posting Part Nine. What else is new? Haha.

Well, all of the writing contest entries are up over the The Doll Wardrobe - Feel free to vote! Every vote helps determine who wins the $20 AG gift card! 

Links to read the entries: http://thedollwardrobe.blogspot.com/p/contact-us.html

http://thedollwardrobe.blogspot.com/p/current-photo-contest.html

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              I sat on the floor, alone in the studio. What if no one came back? Would I have to follow Louise out that door? Out into 1841 Cherbourg, France? If I was making this all up in my head, how was my muddled mind going to figure that one out? I had never been to France; I didn’t even know what it looked like. Would it be the France I saw in a theme park as a child?

             Just as I was thinking about how ridiculous this all was, a new older man walked into the room. He was carrying something that looked like a violin.

            “Are you the musician?!” I shouted as I bolted off the floor toward him.

             “My goodness! Who are you? Where is everyone? And what are you wearing?!” he shot back.

             I looked down. Yep, I was wearing my normal 2011 clothing. Probably pretty bizarre for 1841. Especially my vintage Guns ’N Roses T-shirt.

“Don’t ask questions,” I replied. “Just play the song you usually play for Louise and the artist. The song that belongs to the painting.”

He eyed me suspiciously. “Oh, you are one of those people.” He scowled and grumbled about “silly magic.” Then he began to play his violin.

It was a simple enough tune. A casual melody. I tried to hum along. This was going to get me home. I closed my eyes and considered clicking my heels.

“You aren’t listening to it,” the musician snapped as he stopped playing. “Also, what happened to my friends?”

“Oh, they are fine. Both fine. The artist left when I showed up and Louise went home.” I decided to leave out a full description of the events.

“That doesn’t sound like something Louise would do, not this early in the day.” He glared at me.

“Eh, we had this heart-to-heart conversation about Michael and she decided to leave. That’s all. Girl stuff. Romance. Matters of the heart. Play that song again.” My words clicked along like the song I needed to hum.

“Oh. I understand,” he said. Though I don’t think he understood at all. “Fine. You almost had it. Let me hum it to you, and then we’ll hum it together.” He smiled.

For some reason he was being very nice now. He probably wanted me out of the painting as much as I wanted out of it.

He laid out the tune by himself and then we hummed it together once. After that he started to play the violin again and signaled me to keep humming.

It was working. The studio began to spin around me and after everything had blurred into a frenzy of swirling colors, I was back in the museum, staring at the painting of Louise.

And I wasn’t face down on the floor. What luck!

I caught my breath and looked around to see if anyone had noticed what just happened. No one even looked at me. My head hurt a little bit, but not that bad. I hadn’t felt pain at all inside the painting. Maybe it had been just a hallucination. I took a few steps to the side, trying to look nonchalant, and proceeded to bang my knee into a bench. Ouch. That hurt.

I grabbed my leg and looked down at my knee to make sure it was still attached. Then my eyes drifted back to Louise’s and I could have sworn she winked at me. At this, I practically jogged out of the room.

I scurried into the next gallery, a space full of sculptures, and planted my tush down on a cushioned bench next to some naked Greek god. 

Not on purpose though. I drummed my fingertips on the cushion, suddenly feeling rather uncomfortable sitting so close to a statue of a man sans clothing. But I didn’t feel like moving yet; my knee still smarted. It was going to be at least a two-week bruise. I tried not to look at the statue as I recovered from my injury. Instead I hummed something to fill the silence, attempting to look casual, massaging my poor knee.

My thoughts floated back to Louise, Michaël, and the painting. Was it magic? Or was it neurological? Had I really gone into the painting? Did all of that really happen?

Someone tapped me on the shoulder.

“Yeah?” I asked looking up at the person, expecting to see a guard who would tell me to stop humming.

“My, you are a lovely young woman. Where would you like to go today?” the statue said as he shifted his weight, looked at me closely and grinned. I stared up at him.

“That statue just smiled at me,” I said to the empty room. Well, empty except for the statue that was still looking at me. He blinked, waiting for me to say more. “You’re naked,” was all I managed to stutter.

His right eyebrow went up. “I’m not naked. I’m nude. A celebration of the male form. Of the beauty of nature. I am Apollo, the ideal male. God of the sun, of prophecy, of the arts, and of mice. I am the most beautiful man ever to exist.”

During this monologue there had been a lot of dramatic arm gestures and he had adjusted the crown upon his head assertively.

“You’re still naked,” I replied, averting my gaze.

“Hmmmm,” he pursed his lips and picked up a swath of marble from his feet that moved like it was cloth. He wrapped it over himself. “Is this better?”

“Uh, yeah.”

Yep, this statue was talking to me. Or was I just talking to myself in Crazy Land?

“So where would you like to go today?” he continued. “I can’t even count the years it has been since one of you has visited me. I used to see droves of you. But not anymore.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Magical persons. I used to see them in Italy and France all the time. But not here.”

“When were you in Italy and France? You’re a statue.”

“I was carved in Venice and I was moved to France, you silly girl. I had a brief stint in the Bahamas. Oh my, that was nice. And now I am here, in Cali-fornia.”

“Okay, I just went into a painting and now I’m talking to a statue. Is this really happening?”

“Of course it is. You are a magical person. Haven’t you done this before?”

“No. No, I haven’t. This is all new to me,” I answered.

“Strange. There used to be apprenticeships and years of study. You look old enough to know about all of this.”

“Did you just say I look old?”

Cough. “No, absolutely not. Anyway, I can bring you to any place I have been. I think we should go to Venice. I have fond memories of it and it is the perfect place to explore when you’re new to this game,” he explained.

“How in the world would we go to Venice? We are in a museum on the other side of the globe.”

Apollo stepped off his pedestal and sat down on the bench next to me. He held out his hand for mine. When I hesitantly placed my palm into his, he beamed. “Hum that tune again,” he said.

“What tune?”

“The one you were humming before.”

“But I don’t remember it.”

“Alright. I see you are a novice. Close your eyes. Clear your mind. And then think of me,” he said slyly. Pompous hound.

But I thought of him just the same. God of the sun, of silly crowns, of nakedness, of cream-colored marble, and of mice. And then I was humming, note after note, the tune falling up and down like a pleasant waltz.

When I opened my eyes I was in a stone carver’s studio, surrounded by chunks of marble in various stages of completion. Apollo was next to me, dancing in rhythmic circles and strumming a tiny harp.

“Oh how I love Venice!” he sang — in Italian, but I could understand him.

“Why did I just do that?!” I moaned. My words were also in Italian, even though I didn’t know the language. Not this again!

“Do what?” Apollo asked, as if he hadn’t just contributed to the issue at a hand.

“Why did I hum that thing?! Quick, hold my hand again. I don’t want to be in Venice.”

“Why not?” Apollo asked with an injured tone.

“I just barely managed to get out of the painting I went into. I can’t just be popping in and out of places when I don’t have the ability to control it!”

“Too late!” Apollo smiled.

“Ugh!” I sat down on the ground and started to think about Apollo again in an attempt to remember the song. “Sun, harps, mice,” I said aloud.

“It won’t work,” he stated.

“Why not?”

“We have to work together. Because you’re not trained enough to do it on your own. So if I don’t allow you to tap into my strength you can’t go anywhere.”

Why did the first magical statue I met have to be such a jerk? On second thought, I should have said that aloud.

“Oh, fine,” I replied. “I’ll just call my Dad and tell him what’s going on. He’ll probably fly over here, scream at me, and then beat you into a fine dust.” I fumbled through my bag to find my phone. Apollo looked at me skeptically. 

Stay tuned for Part Ten!

And please vote in The Doll Wardrobe Writing Contest!

Part Eight: Together, But Alone

Sorry for the slight delay with this part, I meant to have it ready sooner. In part eight I resolve the previous cliffhanger. There is still a cliff at the end of this one, just not as obvious. ;-)

Just to let you guys know - I have a lot written for future parts of the story - they still have to be edited though. :-(

Also, check out my Writing Contest over at The Doll Wardrobe Blog: http://thedollwardrobe.blogspot.com/2012/03/maples-first-writing-contest-begins.html

Winner receives a $20 AG gift card!

We already have two entries, which you can read here: http://thedollwardrobe.blogspot.com/p/contact-us.html

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          “You can see me,” the young man said expectantly.

          “Yes. Yes I can, strange, creepy guy,” I replied as I plastered a fake smile across my face. He looked away and said nothing more. He seemed to be concentrating on the pattern of the floorboards.

I started to nod my head up and down nervously. I looked at Louise. She was clueless. It was like he wasn’t here at all. My mental gears slowly began to turn. “Yes, Louise there is someone else here besides you and I. And I am guessing he is dead.”

The young man’s desperate gaze snapped back to me.

“Dead?!” Louise gasped as she got up from her stool.

“Yep. That’s my thing. Seeing dead people, or so my father tells me. Apparently it even happens in my magical painting hallucinations,” I nodded some more.

“That can’t be,” she replied.

“That can be. And since only I can see this man, he is probably a ghost.” More nodding. It was impossible to hold my head steady.

“ I am deceased,” the man finally said. “Tell her it is Michaël. I’m Michaël. Tell her I am here.”

“I think his name is Michael or something. He’s, you know, here in the room.” I emphasized that last bit with a theatrical voice while widening my eyes, fluttering my fingers, and putting on my best fake-psychic face. It was an attempt to lighten the mood.

“He can’t be here. He can’t,” she said sternly.

“Uh. I’m not sure what to tell you, but how could I make this up? I mean I guess I could, but what would be the point?”

Tears welled up in Louise’s eyes.

“He can’t be here because he isn’t dead!” she yelled. I winced.

“She’s been waiting for me,” Michaël said quietly. “But I have been gone for eight months.”

“Well, not really. You’ve been hanging out here, creepily,” I replied.

“Who are you talking to?” Louise demanded.

“I already told you, this guy here, Michael.”

“But he isn’t here!” she cried.

Poobottoms. This wasn’t getting through to her. “Yes, he is here and he says he’s been dead for eight months.”

“He isn’t dead!” she sobbed.

“Yes, he is.”

More crying ensued and then she crumpled into a ball on the floor.

If I had felt awkward before, now I really felt out of place. I looked around for a convenient hole to crawl into and saw all the energy drain out of Michaël. He stared down at Louise.

“Why are you here if you are dead?” I asked.

“I can’t go when she is so unhappy,” he responded as he walked over to her. He delicately placed his hand on her head. She didn’t notice the warm gesture; she probably couldn’t feel it. “I will be by her side until her heart lets go of mine. She is holding onto me.”

Now my eyes were starting to tear up. What was wrong with me? I coughed, blinked them away, and pretended to have the sniffles.

“I loved her so. I still love her. But I am so tired,” he sighed. He stiffened as he took his hand off her head and stood up straight. I would say his face looked like death, but there was no question on that issue.

Was this what ghosts had to do? Stick by whoever was left behind, whoever was still thinking about them? That’s depressing.

Was that why my mother appeared to me? Was she glued to me like this poor fellow was stuck to Louise? Man, I had barely even known her. How could that be? I didn’t feel like I thought about her a lot. Or maybe I did.

“Have you been thinking about him, Louise?” I asked her.

“Every day. Every day,” she said softly in between sobs. An unattractive river of snot poured out of her nose. Should I do something? Did they have tissues in 1841? I didn’t see any in the room. I crouched beside her and patted her back. I looked up at Michaël. He gazed at her lovingly, but he seemed like a lonely scarecrow in an empty field.

I tried to get a conversation going. “Have you really been waiting for him? I mean you got married and all.” Louise snapped her head up and glared at me.

Oops.

“Of course I got married! My father told me I had to, and Michaël had not returned from the war!” She looked ready to spit in my face.

“Okay. Okay. Let’s just be rational here,” I tried to sound wise, but didn’t have a clue what to say next.

“Tell her I lost my life and she can stop waiting for me. She must move on with her husband. Make a new life. Find a new love with him,” Michael said.

“Yeah, all that stuff isn’t really gonna soften the blow, buddy,” I sighed.

“What did he say? Tell me what he said,” Louise looked pleadingly at me.

“Well he must have died in a war. And you can stop waiting. Perhaps you should go hang out with your husband and learn to like him instead.” I tried to say it off-handedly like I was explaining tomorrow’s forecast. I smiled at the end. Goodness knows why.

Louise went back to crying. Michaël sat down on the bench.

“What can I say to comfort her?” he asked. Maybe to me, maybe to no one.

I ran through several possible scenarios in my head that I could present. 1) He never loved you, move on. Eh, too rough. 2) He was actually in love with your sister, not you. Wait, I didn’t know if she had a sister. Her brother? Didn’t know if she had one of those either. Too flimsy. 3) Hey, your sorrow is keeping him here for eternity and we all wanna get outta this prison-like room, so why not let it go? Hmmm, yeah. Not quite.

Ah. I got it now. Number four.

“So this guy, he says he loves you very much and that is why he is here for you. He will stay by your side forever to make you happy. He doesn’t want you to be sad anymore,” I announced to the room. “Since you know he is here now, you can talk with him anytime you want to. He’ll be right here. Forever. That’s what he just told me.”

Michaël looked at me, perplexed. Louise seemed stunned, though not totally unconvinced.

“Forever?” she asked.

“Oh yeah, eternity,” I nodded my head. She turned away, thinking.

I could tell it hadn’t quite worked yet. “Yep. He just said he’s not interested in going to heaven, or wherever it is that people go when they die. I always thought it was probably just a really clean coffee shop with free pumpkin bread. But that’s beside the point. He doesn’t want to join his deceased comrades in arms, or his, errr, relatives there. He’ll just stay here in this artist’s studio, and we all know how great it is here.” I looked at her, trying to gauge her reaction.

“What are you doing?” Michaël asked me. I shrugged. I couldn’t say anything to him without giving away the ruse. And I was pretty sure he didn’t know what charades were.

“He’ll stay here? Forever?” Louise asked again, this time with discomfort in her voice.

“Oh yeah. He’s in it to win it. You know, despite being dead and all.”

She squinted at me.

“That’s not fair,” she said softly.

“Life’s not fair,” I wanted to reply, but I held my tongue. “Not fair?” I responded instead. “Why isn’t that fair?”

“That I should be here alive, and he can’t go anywhere or do anything because he is dead.”

“Oh?” I held my breath.

“I think I know what you are doing now,” Michaël said. He shifted on the bench. “I’m ready to go, if she’ll let me.” He looked sorrowful but resolved. Leaning back on the bench, against the wall, he sunk into the shadows.

I felt a pang of guilt for lying to Louise. But then I remembered how she looked in her painting, as if she would never be happy again. And here he was, stuck staring at her sad face forever. Not really the type of romance one dreams of.

“Do you think he should go visit his chums upstairs, so-to-speak?” I asked. “See something else besides these four walls?”

“Yes,” she said. “He should go. I love him too much to make him stay here any longer.” Louise remained on the floor for several more minutes, seemingly contemplating her own words.

Then she stood up and threw her chin in the air. Her tears kept flowing, but she pretended they weren’t there. “I’m going to go home now. I’m sorry I can’t stay until the musician comes back. But you’ll be okay. I can’t stay here anymore. Tell Michaël I love him and I’ll always love him. But he should go.” She delivered her speech with pained determination, and swept out of the room.

Michaël and I sat in silence for a while. I am not sure what I expected to happen.

“I think I will be able to leave now,” he finally whispered.

“Where will you go?”

“I’m not sure. Where do people go when they die?”

I thought of café mochas and cream cheese on pumpkiny treats. He started to fade away in front of me like thick smoke curling into the air.

“I don’t know,” I whispered back.

And then he was gone. I stared at the nothingness that had been Michaël. I hoped he had gone somewhere nice. Tears seeped out of my eyes and I didn’t fight them.

Part Seven: After the Music

Sorry it has been a month since I posted more of my story!

Here is Part Seven, enjoy!

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I jumped from the shock and the girl did, too.

“What the?!” a nearby man stammered as he flinched. “Oh heavens. Not another one of these people.”

Though she was as surprised as me, the young woman quickly gained her composure. “Oh, hello! It’s been ages since someone visited us. What’s your name?”

“What are you talking about? Where am I? What just happened?”

The man huffed. “It was nice being left alone, Louise. To do our work.” He set his pencils and paper onto a table. “Tell her to go home,” he added.

“Your work. Not mine,” Louise said emphatically. “And I don’t mind being interrupted.” She smiled at me. “You entered our painting, young lady. Last time it was a handsome young man.”

“Last time, what?” is all I managed to stutter.

I noticed she spoke French, yet I could understand her. And the weird thing was I think I was talking in French, even though I had never taken a French class in my life. This was too much to process. I looked for somewhere to sit down and spied a bench.

“Who are you guys?” I asked after sitting.

The man looked at me with disdain and began speaking very slowly as if I wouldn’t understand him. “I am the artist whom you are interrupting. That is my friend’s wife. I am preparing her portrait. This is my studio. You can leave it as soon as possible.” He seemed like a real gem.

“My name is Louise. What’s yours?” the girl asked, completely ignoring the man’s comments.

“Uh, my name is Stella. How come I can understand and speak French? I’ve never been able to do that before.”

“It’s the magic of the painting, combined with your magic,” she replied.

This had to be a hallucination, a nightmare. I was probably passed out cold on the museum floor or being taken to a hospital and this was just my damaged brain playing horrid little games with me. I decided to cut to the chase. I needed to wake up.

“How do I get out of this place? This painting you say I entered?”

“You need to hum the song, the one the musician plays,” Louise explained. “Every work of magical art has its own tune. In order to get here you had to have hummed our song. Didn’t you know that?”

Stupid song. Stupid humming. “No, I didn’t know that. It was an accident. A song just popped into my head.”

“That is because you are magical. You can hear the song, just like that handsome young man did.” She smiled again.

“So someone was here before and he got out?”

“Yes, the young man who entered the painting left a long time ago,” she replied with a hint of sadness in her voice.

 “Okay, but I don’t remember the song now. I can’t hear it in my head. Where is this musician? Where do I find him?” I had obviously been playing too many video games recently. Even my nightmares were sending me on quests.

“Lucien, the musician, will be back soon. He just went out for his midday meal. You can wait here for him. I’d hum the song for you, but I never remember those types of things,” Louise answered.

At this the artist swept his arm across the table, flinging paper and pencils everywhere, while groaning angrily. “That’s it. I won’t be back until she is gone. I can’t work like this!” He left the studio after wagging his finger at me. Louise stuck her tongue out at him as he made his exit.

“He may be my husband’s friend, but I don’t like him very much. Actually I don’t like my husband very much either.” She winked at me.

“How long have you been married?” I asked.

“I don’t know. How old is this painting?” She said as she shifted her weight on her stool.

“I haven’t got a clue. You mean you are like 300 years old or something?” I replied, completely puzzled.

“No, I’m 17. But in this world I’m always 17. So we are always just married, and we live without any concept of time.”

“Oh,” I responded, my eyes widening.

“What year is it now in your world?”

“2011.”

“Ah, so the painting is 170 years old. There is the answer to your question.”

“So you’re trapped in this painting forever? Are you from my world and you got stuck in here?”

“No, we were all created in this world, the world of the painting. We are only meant to exist here, not coming and going like the magical people.”

“You live in this painting. But where? How?”

“Well, technically we live in Cherbourg, France, and we mostly subsist on a diet of bread, cheese, and wine. Not sure how else to answer you.”

“So your world is the same as my world, just from 170 years ago? And you are sort of in an endless time loop-bubble thing?”

“Sure. That’s the best way to explain it, I guess,” she replied, nodding her head in agreement. Though I’m not quite sure she had understood my babbling. I am pretty sure she was just trying to be nice.

This nightmare seemed a little too advanced for my brain to have come up with on its own.

“The young man told me all of this when he visited. Before he came, we didn’t even know we were in a painting. He said it was the magic in the paints that had created our world. And that some magical people could come here and leave as long as they knew the song.”

“Some? Not all? He told you a lot of stuff. Any idea who he was so I can ask him some questions, too?” I asked, mostly joking.

“He called himself Coventry. Never said his first name. Just Coventry.”

Well that wasn’t my last name, and it didn’t sound familiar. Kind of a dead end. What a fantasy and a farce. Magical paintings. Yeah, right. My Dad had mentioned magical powers, but not magical paintings.

A young man walked in and sat down in a chair on the other side of the room.

“Who is that? Is that Lucien? Or Coventry?” I asked Louise while pointing to him.

“Who is who?” she responded.

“The young man that just walked in. Who is he? Please tell me he is the musician so I can get out of here.”

The young man looked at me with a shocked expression, got up from his chair and started walking toward me.

“Okay, he’s got kind of a creepy vibe,” I said, getting up from the bench. I wasn’t sure where I planned on going, but I wasn’t going to stick around some weird guy.

“There is no one else here besides you and me,” Louise said.

“So who is this standing right in front of me?” I asked, genuinely panicking.

Part Six: An Impulsive Escape

Maple here - Welcome to Part Six of my story about my friend Stella!

Enjoy!

......

As I slept on my bedroom floor, I dreamt of my first day of school as a senior. I had just spent the summer soaking up the rays on the French Riviera. As I walked into the school’s main lobby, everyone stopped to look at me. Some people held Time magazines in their hands and whispered my name. My face was on the magazine’s cover with the headline “Supermodel Serves as CIA Spy in L.A. High School!” My secret had been exposed! Now they all knew the truth!

I woke with a thunk, having rolled my head into the leg of my desk chair.

What a bizarre dream. I was neither a supermodel nor a CIA spy. Nor had I ever hoped to be either one. Though I wouldn’t mind this dream coming true. Then all my classmates would know they had underestimated me all these years. Being a gorgeous undercover agent was a lot better than being the pale, hopeless idiot I had really been (and still was).

I suppose everyone wishes that they were a more exciting version of themselves. And in high school you want to rub that more exciting version in people’s faces. Sure, it is totally superficial and tasteless, but you still want to do it.

Now I was moving. A new home. A new school. New math classes to fail. New gym classes to embarrass myself in. And a whole new batch of people who will learn how unimpressive I really am. I wouldn’t get the chance to show my current classmates how awesome I could be. Then again, I didn’t really think awesomeness was in me. I wanted to bang my head against the chair leg on purpose, but noises from downstairs distracted me. I heard my Dad talking to someone about boxes and dishes. Could the movers be here already?! How long did I sleep for?

I got up off the floor and inched open the door.

“Yeah, just pack up the whole kitchen. I know if I do it, everything will break.” My father’s words floated up from the kitchen.

I eased the door closed. This was really happening. I must have slept the whole night. Time was marching steadily forward while I drooled on my rug.

I decided to not think about that and instead packed my biggest purse with supplies. I was leaving. Why would I want to stay here and then be dragged to who knows where? Maybe L.A. and I hadn’t ever really clicked, but it was the only home I had ever known. It was familiar. I changed my clothes, grabbed my purse, and snuck down the stairs and out the back door. My Dad, in the center of a swarm of movers, didn’t even notice.

Running away wasn’t going to do any good. But I felt like leaving so I did. I never said I wasn’t impulsive.

I headed to the art museum. I knew nothing about art, but I liked their gardens, so I often hung out there after school. I boarded the museum tram and zipped along the California hillside toward my destination. People around me chatted and looked excitedly out of the windows. It must be nice to be a carefree tourist. As our ride ended at the front courtyard it started to rain. One of the five days of the year that it rains in L.A. had to be today.

I dragged my feet across the plaza and begrudgingly went into the museum lobby and followed the hallways to the indoor galleries. I wanted to see the gardens, but I certainly didn’t want to be wet as well as depressed.

For a while I just looked at the floors and ceilings as I trudged along. My eyes floated over paintings, guards hovering in doorways, statues on pedestals and tourists listening to headsets. But then a woman caught my eye. She stared at me with an air of melancholy — from inside a painting. Even though she was formed of paint, she seemed to be judging my appearance and movements. She looked vibrant enough to open her mouth, take a breath, and tell me her name. I looked at her prim hairstyle with funny looped braids, her modest black and white dress, her tiny hands, her wedding band, and then I stared back into her sullen brown eyes.

She appeared too young to be married, and too sad to have ever been happy. She looked how I felt. Her life had changed, but not by her choice. Her father probably had a conversation with some guy and suddenly she was ripped from her home. Sent off to marry and live with a stranger. A new home. A new life. And there was no going back.

Without realizing it, I had been humming a song as I studied the painting. My headache started tapping at my temples along with the beat. I felt the room begin to spin, slowly at first, then faster and faster.

All I could do was hope I wouldn’t pass out and fall on my face in the museum. The room flipped upside down around me. I closed my eyes to block out as much as of this roller coaster as possible. When I opened them, the young woman was still looking at me. Except I was standing right next to her, and she was just as alive as I was.

Part Five: Dad's Decision

Message from me, Maple, the author of this fantastic story: I'm so sorry for the super-long delay with Part Five! I know I published Part Four in October and you probably thought I had stopped working on my story project. Not true! I was just really busy with schoolwork. :-( But I kept writing little things on the side. I'll try to be better about posting parts of the story this year.

Oh and if you need to refresh your memory about where the story currently is -- just reads part one through four again! Haha. Luckily you don't have to read too much to figure out where we left off. ;-)

Without further ado... Part Five!

.........................

I stared at my Dad for a while, not sure what to say. How could I say I saw a ghost and he just accepts that as fact? What was going on?

“When you feel like getting up, come downstairs,” he said. “But keep resting if you want. We’ll talk more later.” He stood up and left the room, closing the door behind him. But he didn’t walk away. He hesitated by the door for a few moments. Then he walked downstairs.

I wasn’t about to sit in bed while he avoided talking to me. I got up and followed him. He sat at the kitchen table, armed with a plate of oatmeal cookies. I grabbed one and started to munch.

“Oh, you got up,” he said, stalling.

“Did you expect me to sit up there wondering if we are both insane?”

“Nope," he sighed. "Let’s start with what you need to know: you have special abilities and your mother had them as well. Like being able to see ghosts, for example. I know it sounds ridiculous, but that’s the truth. Not all humans are the same. Some are different, with gifts. These powers emerge when you are an adolescent, and that is causing your headaches, and probably your nightmares, too.”

I stared at him, my mouth open with oatmeal cookie crumbs dropping out of it.

“You’re a teenager now and your powers want to be used. Years ago my friend Penny activated a spell to prevent that from happening. Obviously it didn’t work. And so we need to go see her and she’ll help you get rid of your headaches.”

“Is she like a doctor for people like me?” I asked, unsure of why that even mattered.

“No. And yes. I don’t know how to explain it. But I do know that we have to move to where Penny is so that she can help you.”

“Is she the person you were going to talk to about me?”

“Yes.”

So that phone conversation had been with Penny.

“How long will we be gone?” I asked.

“Well, when I said we have to move there, I meant move there. Permanently. We need to stay where Penny is; I think that might be the only way she can fix what is happening. And unfortunately, she can’t come to us.”

“So you mean leave. Leave this house, this street, this city, your job, my school. Leave everything?” I was trying to wrap my head around all of this.

“Yes. I will call the movers now to help us pack. We’ll leave as soon as it is all in the truck. I know this is sudden, but it has to be done, for your health and for your safety.”

I sat silently at the table. I turned my eyes away from him and stared angrily at the tabletop. I couldn’t bring myself to look at him. What did I expect from him now? He had been lying to me all my life. Or withholding information. Either way, I was angry. And now my life was going to be turned upside down. That made me even angrier.

I stood up abruptly and barked, “I’m not going anywhere!” I pushed my chair away from the table, yelling an unintelligible, “Arrrrggghhheeekk.” Then I ran up the stairs, slammed the bedroom door, and sat down on the floor in a ball. The tears came.

How could he have kept all of this from me?

That was the one thought that kept surfacing in my mind as I tried to visualize my future. A future that was as blank as my math notebook. If he lied about all of this - my powers, my headaches, my mother - what else had he lied about?

My father walked up to my door. “I know it might not seem logical to you right now, but I never said anything about this before in order to protect you and to give you a normal life. I wanted to do that for you. And for your mother.”

I felt like sinking into the floor as I kept sobbing. I wanted to scream and yell at him. Tell him off. But instead I felt all of the energy drain out of my body and sleep overtook me.

Part Four: A Hint of the Truth

Me again! Sorry for the delay again. My written drafts aren't perfect and they need editing before publication. So I am a bit slow with posting them. Haha. ;-)

            I heard my Dad rustle around in the kitchen and then he came back upstairs into my room with a glass of water.

            “Oh, hi there,” he said. “How do you feel?”

            “I just woke up. I still have a headache,” I said as I struggled to sit up in bed. I looked up at him, waiting to hear what he had to say. But I didn’t want him to know I had just eavesdropped on his phone call.

            “So you’ve had these bad headaches for awhile now. Sometimes you talk in your sleep. And you said you had a nightmare this morning. Have you been having a lot of bad dreams lately?” he asked.

            “Well the only dream I can remember is one where I am walking down a road and I find a gate. I’ve had that one a lot for the past five months. But last time there was man in it.”

“What kind of man?”

I knew he was going to think I was crazy.

“A man who wasn’t one. He was just a skeleton, wearing a mask.”

My Dad’s face turned pale and serious.

“What was this man doing?”

“Well he told me to come with him. But then….”

“Yes?”

“He started to strangle me,” I whispered. I felt silly saying it aloud. I looked at the glass of water intently. I was sure such a nightmare was a sign of a mental disorder or something.

My Dad pulled my desk chair up beside the bed and sat down.

“Then what happened?”

“I woke up.”

“Has anything else happened?”

“Like what?”

“What happened in the bathroom?”

“My headache came. Normal stuff. Then my legs fell out from under me.”

“And you passed out.”

“Yeah.”

“So besides the skeleton man, have you seen anything else in your dreams or while you’ve had your headaches?”

Should I tell him? I tapped my finger on the glass.

“I can see you’re hesitating. You can tell me anything. I am here to help. I need to know everything in order to solve this.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve seen someone else. Twice.”

“A woman with purple hair? A little animal thing?”

“Who? What? No, not an animal. It was Mom. I saw Mom’s ghost twice — I think. But just today. Never before.”

“Did she say anything to you?” He looked down for a moment.

He wanted to know what she said?

“You don’t seem shocked that your crazy daughter is seeing your dead wife.”

“I’m not. I suppose it was only a matter of time. Did she say anything though?”

“No, not really, just my name. And that she was glad I could see her, which I didn’t really agree with. Are you telling me you expected me to see my dead mother one day? Do mental disorders run in our family?”

“I thought you might be able to see her someday. You aren’t insane. Her ghost is always here with us.”

He said it so matter-of-factly.

“Are you trying to creep me out?”

“No. Your mother could see ghosts and I thought you might get that gift as well. That runs in the family.”

“So she was really here? As a ghost?”

“Yes. And she’s probably in this room right now, listening to this conversation. She’s probably pretty mad at me for not talking about this with you earlier.” He looked down again and clenched his jaw.

I squinted at him, perplexed. Was this what he was going to tell me today?