Zelda

by Connie Furnari

  ZELDA

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Zelda

  Connie Furnari – Bibliography

  Romance:

  Paranormal Romance:

  Fantasy:

  Sci-Fi:

  Poetry:

  The lighthouse stands out, majestic. Its shape is almost surreal, blurred in the mist flowing up from the ocean, opaque like the last glimmer of a dream.

  I look up and catch a glimpse of light coming from the room on top: that light seems more dazzling than the lighthouse itself. It’s the power.

  My legs move on their own, they climb the stairs and lead me to the radiance.

  The clothes that I’m wearing are not mine: black leather pants, dark low-neck top that shows my breasts. My ears are full of piercings and I’m wearing a flashy silver cross around my neck. My long, straight black hair has a bright purple highlight.

  She is waiting for me and, in a while, one of us will die.

  Either me or her, this time.

  I open the door and I find myself in a round chamber, it’s the lighthouse keeper’s room. There’s a camp stove on a shelf, an iron bed with a blanket, a wardrobe gnawed by the moths.

  “You’ve come at last, Sheila.” The girl gives me a smug smile. She pronounces that name with a derisory tone. She’s wearing jeans and a pink shirt with embroidered flowers. Her golden blond hair is tied in a ponytail.

  “That is not my name.” I say in a serious tone while moving forward. “I am Zelda. You are Sheila. Make sure to remember that.”

  She shakes her head and a wicked laugh escapes from her lips.

  “I never thought I would have so much fun. Tell me the truth; you didn’t expect this little prank, did you?”

  A pool of blood widens at her feet. A man is lying prone; the wound on his side is deep.

  My enemy kicks the lifeless body with disgust.

  “He didn’t want to let me in and I got a little angry. You know, I always had a bad temperament.”

  She killed the lighthouse guardian on a whim. She is out of control now.

  “Give back what you took from me, Sheila.” I emphasize the name with hostility, to let her know that I am still fully conscious of who I am.

  “Uhm.” She starts walking up and down the room, arrogantly.

  “You mean this?” she says, pointing at her body, the body that was mine until a few days ago. “You’re not that great after all; you have split ends in your hair and an incipient cellulite under your butt. And don’t get me started with that annoying mole beneath the boobs! How did you manage to put up with it all this time? Don’t you know any good dermatologist?”

  She laughs, finding amusing the knowledge of having me under her control.

  She crumples the pink shirt. “You have no idea of how ridiculous I feel. I look like Skipper, Barbie’s dumb sister.”

  “You can keep my body.” I say, trying to look determined. “I want the other thing you took from me.”

  “Oh, right, silly me!” she chortles ironically and slaps her forehead lightly. She saunters to the wardrobe and moves her fingers. Both doors open simultaneously revealing what’s inside.

  “Paul.” I groan, unable to stop myself.

  He’s gagged and tied down with ropes in the closet. His eyes convey his feelings; it’s as if I was able to read his mind.

  Now he knows that I lied to him since the day we first met.

  “Set him free.” I order.

  “Let me think...” Sheila sarcastically looks up and, after a while, answers clocking her finger from side to side. “No, no!”

  I sigh and lower my head. “I’ll give you what you always wanted, but you must promise me that you won’t hurt him.”

  “Aww, so romantic.” she says clasping her hands together, as she faked being touched by it. “You really fell in love with a mortal.”

  She approaches Paul and smells his scent, she kisses him on the neck and her tongue eagerly slithers out while he tries, in vain, to turn his head away. “But I can’t blame you, after all. You know, I have been pretty close with your boyfriend, and I was able to test his....potential.”

  Jealousy bursts in my body.

  I feel sick to my stomach, but I can’t do a thing, other than humoring her in this stupid game. She is crazy enough to kill him just to force me to use my powers.

  I wish I could strangle her for saying those phrases. But I refuse to think about what happened. What they did.

  But the images seep into my mind nevertheless, because of my enemy’s power: she is summoning a reminiscence.

  I can see her, she is climbing through the window into Paul’s room. He is lying on the bed, nodding while listening to the music on his I-pod. As soon as he notices her presence, he pulls away the headphones and approaches her.

  “Zelda, what are you doing here?” he asks, surprised. For a moment, he glances at the door, probably worried that his parents are home.

  She kisses him. She clings to his neck and possessively holds him close.

  They keep kissing and I stay there, watching the vision, hypnotized.

  Sheila starts to run her fingers over his jeans, making her way to his chest.

  Paul steps back, shocked but clearly excited. “Didn’t you say it was too soon? That you didn’t feel ready?”

  The girl laughs. “Did I say something like that? Classic!” she caresses his cheek.

  She pushes him on the bed and crawls on top, pinning him between her legs. She grabs his hair and start kissing him again.

  The vision fades away, blurring in the fog and vanishes, dissolving.

  “I don’t think you want to see the rest, am I right?” She asks me, lasciviously. “I don’t want to shock your child-like innocence.”

  I narrowed my eyes. I don’t have time to think about what happened in that room, my priority is to get out of the lighthouse as soon as possible, without risking my boyfriend’s life.

  “We had a deal.” I say. “You said that if I give you my magic, you would leave Paul alone.”

  Sheila walks in circles around me. “Guess what, sweetie! I changed my plans.” She smugly laughs again. “I realized that I prefer living your life rather than mine, so I’m keeping your body. I’m blond and beautiful, the first of the class, I have a mother who’s proud of me and a cool boyfriend.”

  She strokes Paul’s brown hair, but he turns away. “Now he hates me, because he found out about my body-shifting trick. But I’ll erase his memories after I kill you, and he’ll be in love with me again, I mean, with you... we had fun together. I was surprised at first, he looks like a good boy! He is good at it, though. He’s been wilder than I expected.”

  A throb of jealousy eats away my insides again. I give up, at last. It gets the best of me, I can’t resist her provocations.

  “Of course.” I say cruelly. “Because we both know that without that spell Paul wouldn’t even look at you.”

  She grits her teeth, my teeth, and comes closer, in a fury.

  She takes an automatic knife from the back pocket of her jeans and flicks it open. “You’ve always thought you were better than me, Zelda. You had an easier life, but that wasn’t enough. You wanted him, too. Just because I loved him. You’ve always wanted to take everything from me.”

  “That is not true, and you know it. I was ready to give my soul for you, you were my best friend.” I gaze at her, unflinching. “Until you started playing dirty.”

  I step back, she looks like a homicidal maniac. I have been scared of her before, but never quite like in this moment.

  Sheila grips the hilt of the knife, her eyes wild and furious. She doesn’t reply, because she knows that everything I’m saying is true.

  We scrutinize each other, ready to fight, our hands shimmering wi
th light.

  One of us will live, the other will die.

  And when the magic explodes, I can’t help but rethink about the day when it all started, a few weeks ago.

  The day of my sixteenth birthday.

  *******

  That morning, I went to school like every other day, with no enthusiasm.

  As soon as I woke up I found myself levitating over my bed, clear sign that the transformation had already started.

  Every witch, on her sixteenth birthday would wake up levitating between the bed and the ceiling. It happened to my mother and grandmother, too.

  “Are you ready for the party, Miss Zelda Blackmoon?” A familiar face greeted me in front of the high-school doors.

  The girl was wearing a pair of black leather pants and a shirt of the same color, her ears were overflowing with piercings and there was a bright purple lock in her long dark hair.

  Sheila Carpenter had always been my best friend; our Cabal has been living in Salem for generations.

  Since the day her mother told her that she was a witch, she changed: she started using new-gothic clothes, smoking in the school toilets and going out with the guys in the last grade. She became a wayward outsider, who didn’t miss a chance to make the teachers mad.

  I, on the contrary, was the same naïve girl who still believed in fairy tales: at night, I preferred staying at home reading or watching TV with my mother.

  My most transgressive piece of clothing was a black frayed shirt.

  The ‘party’ she was talking about was my initiation ceremony. Sheila already went through hers three months ago, when she found out she has powers.

  She couldn’t wait for me to be a full-blown witch, so we could go around in Salem and play pranks on everyone who had dared to make fun of us in our junior years.

  “Look what I learnt.” She lifted her hand over a bush and a kitty’s face poked out. She was making it float in the air.

  “Stop it, you might hurt it.” I tried to stop her.

  She turned it upside down and started swirling it.

  I checked the road, to avoid being seen by someone while using magic, then I lifted my hand and tried to bring that poor animal back on the pavement. The enchantment didn’t work as I expected.

  My power was still too weak.

  Sheila started laughing. “What a washout! You still can’t levitate objects properly.”

  “It’s not an object, it’s a living thing.” I observed.

  My friend snorted and let it fall on the pavement. The cat hit his back, mewed and ran away, scared. She hurt it.

  Sheila was unbearable sometimes. It was not uncommon for her to play with her magic, with the only purpose to demonstrate how powerful she was, especially when I was around.

  I didn’t speak for the rest of the way.

  I was worried about the ceremony, I was afraid that I would not be able to live up to the expectations of the clan. My magic was weak and, apart from a few little tricks, I wasn’t able to perform proper incantations.

  If Ecate hadn’t accepted my prayer, the Cabal would have probably excluded me from the group. I already pictured my mother’s pitiful look, who would tell me without doubt that I will be able to do it the next birthday.

  We arrived in time, the corridor was full of students and many of them greeted Sheila: she was very popular, thanks to her cheerful and helpful personality, especially with boys. There was not a day when they didn’t ask her out.

  I had very few friends, mostly girls in our class, mainly due to my shyness and the fact that I still had problems juggling my ‘witch lifestyle’ and the ‘teenager lifestyle’.

  As soon as we entered the classroom I noticed that something was different.

  There was a new boy. Startled, I hit a desk and hurt my hip, causing all the books I had in my arms to fall on the floor.

  I awkwardly picked them up.

  He looked at me smiling and I smiled back. His eyes were indigo blue and so intense they shocked me, so I took a step back.

  “Who’s that? He’s noteworthy!” Sheila commented at once. “Can you see how handsome he is?” she patted me on the shoulder.

  He was sitting in the last row and he already had three of our classmates flirting with him.

  “I better eliminate the competition right away.” She decided, and strolled over, swinging her hips.

  I sat down on my seat and kept my head down, eavesdropping on the conversation at the back of the classroom.

  In just five minutes, Sheila managed to send away all the admirers, so that she could have the new student’s attention all for herself. When the teacher arrived she took her seat beside me.

  “His name is Paul.” She whispered. “He comes from Boston. He’s even better from close up!” then she added “At the end of the classes, I’m going to ask him on a date.”

  I couldn’t help but grin. “Good luck.” I envied her self-esteem. I could never be able to ask a boy on a date.

  At that point, I turned around because of a weird presentiment. Paul was looking at me. He was looking at me, not Sheila.

  Even though I didn’t want to, I found myself reciprocating his gaze.

  He seemed different from the others. It was as if I was looking in a mirror: that boy’s tact was uncommon in a sixteen year old.

  I had to put him out of my mind. Sheila had a crush on him and a few years ago we sworn that we would never fight over a boy; actually, there had never been such a problem because we had completely different taste in boys. Sheila liked the bad boy type, and I liked the shy type.

  Professor Raymond introduced him to the class: his name was Paul Saunders, he had attended high school in Boston and his family just moved to Salem.

  I turned towards his seat again and we gazed at each other one more time. I groaned, worried.

  I felt my breath stop and I started trembling. My fingers were shining with light, my magic was going to gush out.

  “Look.” I quietly said to Sheila and showed her my palms, making sure they were under my desk.

  “Damn, the transformation process started.” She said in a quiet voice. “You don’t want to start shimmering like a lightbulb here during class, do you?”

  The teacher gave me permission to go to the toilet. When I stood up from my chair, I staggered. Awkwardly, I felt all their eyes on me, while Sheila was shaking her head. Everyone saw me as a clumsy girl.

  Only Paul’s blue eyes seemed to look at me in a different way.

  ***

  I spent that evening lying on the bed in my room.

  I couldn’t help but wonder if Paul agreed to go on a date with Sheila. Undeniable jealousy burned inside of me at the thought of the two of them together.

  She dated boys on a whim, only to dump them as soon she found a better one. I was annoyed by the fact that she was going to do the same to Paul.

  I kept telling myself that I had no rights over him, but something was pulling me towards that boy. I couldn’t understand what was happening; I had never felt so confused and enthusiastic at the same time.

  All that I wanted was to be with Paul Saunders.

  I kept thinking about it for hours, my hands shining with light all the while.

  When I decided to go to my friend’s house, it was around eight p.m.: she usually called me long before that time, for our usual chat. That particular evening we were supposed to make plans about the ceremony that was going to take place at midnight.

  As soon as she opened the door, I noticed her sullen expression.

  “Oh, look, the aristocracy stoops to visiting the peasants.” She hissed, annoyed.

  “What happened?” I asked in confusion.

  Sheila stood there in silence, and then she mumbled, her voice was full of rancor. “At the end of the lesson I talked to Paul. Guess what, he asked for your phone number. It seems like he fancies you.”

  A shudder shook my whole body. “Are you kidding me?”

  My heart was pounding and I wished that she wouldn
’t notice.

  “I asked him out on a date and he answered, without beating around the bush, ‘I’d rather go on a date with your friend, the one with blond hair who tripped while she was going to the toilet.’ He asked me to give him your phone number, but I told him to get lost.”

  She faltered, then she continued with a whiney voice. “How could you? I saw him first, I liked that boy!”

  I opened my mouth bewildered, bursting out. “Are you crazy? I didn’t even talk to him! You can’t blame me if he rejects you!”

  Sheila approached me and I stepped back, her eyes were overflowing with rage. “I can assure you, this isn’t the end of it.” She said pointing her finger at me.

  Those words hurt me like sharp arrows and I wasn’t able to restrain myself.

  I was sick and tired of our fights and, most of all, of her superior attitude. “I’m not going to get along with your stupid tantrum this time. You have to leave Paul alone.”

  That last sentence spurted out on its own and when I realized what I said, it was too late.

  She grinned cruelly and replied. “Well, I was right then. You are in love with him, too.” She shook her head, then continued, resolute. “It is war, then. We’ll see who will win in the end.”

  She shut the door and left me alone in her dark front porch.

  I walked home with my hands in the jeans pockets; I didn’t take a jacket with me and I was wearing a light hoodie. I started shaking because I was cold and, most of all, because of my nerves.

  That was not the first time we had a fight, but an unusual sense of worry told me that this time it would be different. I noticed in Sheila a violent rage that I had never seen in her eyes before, as if it was lying dormant, waiting to explode.

  When I arrived in my front yard I saw a silhouette, motionless under a streetlight and barely touched by the light.

  I stopped, startled, when I realized it was Paul.

  “Hi, I was waiting for you.” He said. He smiled, leaning with one shoulder on the street light.

  “How did you know that I live here?” I asked in a daze. It was true. He was even more handsome from up close and my heart started beating hard.

  “I asked at school, after your friend got rid of me with a creative sequence of insults and curse words.” He approached me.