Sharon’s note: I read supernatural academy books. Most of the time they’re pretty bad, but that’s what makes them entertaining. I thought it would be more fun to make fun of them, and it is. It really is. Warning: Set up ended up more serious than the author intended. Oh well. The jokes are coming, she promises.
I rubbed at my eye again before staring at my eye in the mirror. The weird red glow that hovered above my iris like a star on a sapphire was still there. It didn’t interfere with my vision, but it was freaking me out. Glowing spheres floating through the night and smacking into my eyeball was not something I had a coping mechanism for. What was I supposed to do? Go to the hospital? It didn’t hurt. I was leaning towards going to the urgent care.
There was a heavy knock on the door. “Jess? Hurry up! Other people got to use the bathroom.”
“Yeah, yeah.” I unlocked the door and Ricky pushed past me before hustling me out. As I turned to him to ask for a ride, he slammed the door in my face. Ass.
It didn’t surprise me that he didn’t notice the glowy red thing in my eye. There were six people crammed into the three bedroom, one bath, house we shared, but we generally tried to ignore each other. None of us liked sharing a domicile, but it was an unfortunate necessity for poor college students. Silent avoidance made for awkward, but mostly good housemates.
I went to my room to gather up my things. Calling an ambulance seemed kind of extreme, and really expensive, so I used my phone to call for a ride. I was stuffing a couple of textbooks in my bag in case I had time to study while I waited when Amy stalked in. I shared the room with her, so it made sense she would come in without knocking sometimes, but she always did it and it drove me up a wall. It wasn’t that hard to remember and I never forgot.
“There’s a guy at the front door for you,” Abby said. She threw herself down on her bed and glared at me like I’d stolen her favorite top and lost it at a one night stand’s place. Ever since she’d done it to me, she’d acted like I’d done the crime. The guilty were always the most defensive. I hated people.
“That was quick.” Either the driver was just down the street, or there was someone else here. And why hadn’t Abby commented on my eye? She wasn’t as unobservant as Ricky. Maybe it wasn’t as obvious as I thought. Maybe I was hallucinating it and it wasn’t really there. Either way, I needed to see a doctor.
Whoever had showed up to talk to me, I wasn’t in the mood. I stomped to the front door and flung it open. The man on the porch radiated ‘lawyer’. He wore a neat black suit and carried a black leather suitcase. His dark hair was slicked back and his gold framed glasses sparkled in the morning sun. What oddly stuck out to me was his shoes, black leather loafers with shiny pennies tucked in the front.
“Ah, you must be the young lady I’m looking for.” He had a weather forecaster’s smile, professional, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “I am here to change your life.”
Oh. He was a scammer. I shut the door in his face.
“No, wait!” he called through the door. “It’s about the thing in your eye. You have to be curious about it. I can tell you about it.”
I bit my lip for a second, then opened the door. “You can see it? It’s really there?”
He broke into a real grin, and it was somewhere between nice and goblin-esque. Goblinesque. Was that a word? Didn’t matter.
“Oh, it’s there, and I have so much to tell you.” He hefted his briefcase and bounced on his toes, looking more like an excited kid than a lawyer. “I’m not going to lie. This is my favorite part of my job. Welcome to the wonderful world of magic.”
What? I shut the door in his face again.
Part 1
Gray Matters: The Works of Sharon and James Gray 