An uneventful day.

Magic. The fact that it’s real still leaves me stunned sometimes. Even reading up on runes at Frey’s behest, I still don’t understand much of it at all. At least, I think I understand that spirits like Frey are very rare and are beings capable of using it. Julian was possessed by one, too, if only for a while. I’ve been keeping an eye on him since then, mostly out of paranoia, but it doesn’t seem like he even remembers what happened. Good riddance, if you ask me.

Luke Allen… Was it possible that he could use magic, too? I mean, it WAS possible. A better question was if he was actually using it. All I had to go on was the strange feeling I got when he introduced his girlfriends.

It was more than a hunch but far less than proof. I felt something that’s hard to describe, like noticing something I shouldn’t have noticed. Thomas and Mila seemed to agree with me on that.

Honestly, I was worried. Frey had already casted… ‘wards’ on the girls, something to protect them from someone else’s magic, but… I don’t know. I had too many thoughts to list. At times I thought we’d be fine, at others my stomach twisted with worry.

I hoped that the man would just forget about us and go partying with his girls on his yacht or on a cruise or whatever it was that he had. But if he did contact us again… what should I do?

Such were my thoughts as I washed dishes at the coffee shop one day.

“Stop daydreaming,” Maria told me with a harmless smack on the back of the head. “We have more customers.”

“Ah.” I dried my hands, set the cloth aside and went back to the more involved part of my job. Two regulars had come in, a nice old couple who really enjoyed the coffee here.

As nice as it was to see them, I was a bit disappointed. Still no sight of the dark skinned girl. I had to wonder if she’d been so embarrassed by what happened the last time I saw her that she decided to never show up again. I think that’s what I would’ve done, at least.

I blamed my daydreaming on the fact that it was one of those quiet, stress-free days. Sure, the shop was half-full, which was good, but once you take their order to the table, you mostly leave customers be. Maria even answered the phone to talk to a friend of hers.

“Hey! How is it going? You never call me while I’m at work. Are you doing well?”

I tried not to pay attention to her since it was, well, a conversation between friends, but Maria was practically talking next to me while I poured the old couple their coffee.

“How’s everything going at the new place? You brother’s not giving trouble again, is he? Oh, yeah, no worries, I can talk. I’ve got my **** here doing most of the work.”

“I’m expecting a raise or I’m quitting next week,” I told her as I walked past her with a tray with the old couple’s order.

“I’m joking, Oliver!” Maria laughed. “Hm? Oh, yeah, his name’s Oliver. Didn’t I tell you about him? No? By the way, when are you coming over for a cup of coffee, dammit? I’ll even make it Irish just for you.”

The old lady at the table chuckled as I set her coffee on the table. “Must be hard having such a carefree boss, eh dear?”

I chuckled with her. “She works hard. Sometimes.”

The couple laughed, thanked me and I left them alone to enjoy their coffee.

“Hm? Oh, sure, no problem. No, really, it’s not an issue. How much?” I got the impression that the topic became a bit more serious, because Maria had the tact to go to the back to continue her talk.

Not much more to say about that particular day of work. We closed for the day and I went home. Had dinner with the family, then went up to my room to practice some more ocarina of all things. Remember how Thomas gave me one for Christmas? Well, I wasn’t going to let it go to waste.

Cake lay on my bed right beside me as I practiced, comfortably curled on herself, while Isabelle sat at my desk and used my computer to check the stats on our video page.

“We’re growing, Oliver,” she said, cheerful. “Sure, it’s by like 10 people a week, but it’s something, right?” I didn’t answer and Isabelle didn’t expect me to. I was in the middle of playing a song. She turned the chair around and grabbed Cake, lifting her up. “And this ball of fur is taking about half the comments we get. You’re an internet celebrity now.”

At that, Cake yawned.

I finished the song and let out a sigh. “I don’t want to look at the numbers. They make me anxious. Like when I noticed we had 3 less subscribers than the last time I checked. Makes me wonder what we’re doing wrong.”

“...Do you ever get any sun with that dark cloud over your head?”

“Sorry, **** of habit…” I shook my head. “At least I’m getting the hang of the ocarina. I think I might be confident enough to shoot a video playing it.”

“And Cake likes the ocarina, too.”

Cake meowed as if to agree.

So yeah. That was a nice, uneventful day, wasn’t it? Just another plain day of school, work and hobbies. Not a day worth talking about, right?

Yeah, I thought so too, but there’s a reason I’m telling you about it.

You’ll see.

Patreon.