Book of Magic

It is not easy being an orphan. Well, you are not really an orphan, but it sure feels like it recently. After your mother left you and your father to 'find herself', your life has been pretty much a living hell.

First, you lost your college money. Mom and dad were barely able to afford it together, and with your mother now treating you as 'his child, not my responsibility' you can barely afford to finish this last semester. It is a pity too, because you are really starting to get into your chosen major of Astrophysics; not a 'girly' choice, and a major reason that your mother disowned you. Your father, well, you do not really like to think about him. Ever since you turned eighteen, he has been making little comments about how you are 'legal' now. You think that he is just being a pig, but occasionally you caught him looking at you in a way that made you a little nervous. You now have only a few weeks before you need to make the long drive back to your little redneck hometown. You know that with your two years of college, it will be easy to get the most glamorous fry-cook position in town.

Second, your boyfriend just left you. One night, after you spent a long night studying, he called out of the blue to announce that he was leaving you to hook up with some Sorority girl who liked sharing. Not that he ever asked you to share, you think angrily. He merely assumed you were a 'brain' and not interested in any variety. You have a sneaking suspicion that he was only going out with you in order to get help with his Stellar Evolution class.

Finally, you recently found out what your mom has been doing since she left. Apparently, she moved to San Francisco, California and hooked up with an eighteen-year-old lover. Not only that, she is putting her lover through college and letting the lover stay in her apartment. All of this info you got from your aunt, who's lived there since she was your age.

All of this is running through your head as you shift boxes left and right, raising clouds of dust. In order to pay the remains of your bills you have had to take night and weekend jobs in addition to your class work. The pay is shitty, and the work is worse, but it keeps you in school. Today, you have been hired to clean out the attic of an old lady who kicked off after being struck by lightning. No kidding, apparently she was running around the pitch of the local soccer field naked, and zap. Made the local headlines, and page four in many national papers.

There are a lot of boxes, trunks and detritus around the attic. You have been shifting boxes for about an hour, when, while straightening up, you smash your head against the low ceiling. Instead of a nasty bump, your head goes straight through the ceiling, causing a rain of dust to fall about you. You rub the slight welt on the top of you head, and look into the hole, desperately hoping you do not see any spiders. You hate spiders.

What you do see is totally unexpected. Inside the hole is what looks like the cover of an old book. You cannot really tell, but it looks like if just a little more of the ceiling would open up you might be able to get out the book.