Chapter Nine: Timeless by Rosaline Saul
“I
know. What does she look like?”
Jayden starts, “She is, um.” He almost says beautiful but considers after their agreement it is probably not such a good idea. He finishes his sentence, “Pretty.”
Kieran frowns deeply as he puts a fork full of food in his
mouth.
Jayden leans back onto the couch. “This couch stinks. When
are we going to get a new one?”
Distracted Kieran says, “Whenever you want.”
Jayden flips through the same three channels and irritated
Kieran insists, “Just choose one, will you?”
Jayden looks back at Kieran, his eyes intense as he looks at
him. “Hey, are you jealous?”
“No.
Just upset.”
“I
googled curses and spells today.”
“And?”
“About
one seven two oh thousand results in zero point two eight seconds.”
“Anything
we can use?”
“I
did find a Lemon Uncrossing spell, which is guaranteed to break any curse. I do
not know what Dragon’s blood is though, so I’ll have to look it up later.”
“Maybe
you should be more specific in your search, rather than searching curses and
spells. This curse is genuine, and I am sure cannot be broken with a lemon.”
“Do
not forget the dragon’s blood.”
Kieran grumbles unhappily, “I suppose we can try it, what
harm can it do?”
Jayden smiles faintly. “There you go. You get to know
Heather tomorrow at school and then we can ask her to perform a curse breaking
ceremony with us. By the way, her hair is as black as the night.”
Kieran exclaims, “Black? Since when?”
Jayden laughs. “I don’t know since when, but it is black.”
I go to school in Balbriggan, at the Community College. We
used to live here and moved to Drogheda two years ago. We move a lot. My
friends are all there so my parents agreed I could finish my schooling in the
same school. Looking at a map of Ireland it will look as if I travel across two
counties just to get to school, but in fact it really only takes about twenty
minutes by train, on a good day.
My mom usually leaves early for work, before I even drag
myself out of bed, so this morning I decide to take advantage of the early
morning stillness of my house.
In my pyjamas, I go downstairs and then through the kitchen
out the back door into our little back garden. Summer is not here yet, but
there are a few early bloomers popping their heads out from the shrubs
surrounding our patch of grass. I look for a bunch of yellow flowers. I cannot
be fussy because I do not have many flowers to choose from, so I pick a few
which have opened completely.
I go back inside the house, wiping the early morning dew off
my feet vigorously before I step onto the biscuit coloured tiles decorating our
kitchen floor.
Back upstairs, I rummage through the immersion closet for
the large yellow circular tablecloth. My mother likes to pack all her linens
and towels in here on the shelves above the immersion.
I get the little glass jar of St. John’s Wort Oil from the
bathroom cabinet. Celtic Tribes saw the plant called, St. John’s Wort as a
symbol of the sun’s healing and life-giving powers, because of its bright,
yellow flowers. This plant is considered as a king amongst magical plants, and
it protects against negative influences.
Walking back to my room, I cradle everything in my arms
while I make sure not to bruise the yellow flowers. I put the flowers and the
miniature glass jar on my dresser. The large yellow tablecloth billows over my
head as I shake it open, and I lay it down on the floor in the centre of my
room. I pick up the glass jar from my dresser and I pull the cork stopper out
effortlessly. Standing back, I sprinkle a few drops of the blood-red oil onto
the tablecloth. I lean sideways, keeping my feet still and pull two yellow
candles from my nightstand, next to my bedside lamp. Holding it carefully, I
rub a few drops of the oil onto the candles. I step onto the tablecloth and
then I sit down cross-legged in the centre. Reaching up to my dresser, I pull
the bunch of flowers down. I remove two perfect blooms from the bundle and then
after dividing the remainder of the flowers into two bunches, I place a bunch
of flowers on each side of me, at the edge of the cloth.
I light the two candles and then I place one at the edge of
the cloth behind me, and I place the other candle at the edge of the cloth in
front of me.
Picking up the two perfect blooms lying on the cloth by my
knees, I hold them in the upright palm of each of my hands. I look at the
candle ahead of me, and I stare into the flame, focusing all my attention on
that tear-drop shape of yellowy orange.
I chant softly, “Oh healing light, surround me now, relieve
my spirit’s darkest hour.”
As I chant the line repeatedly, I imagine the scented light
being drawn from the candles into the flowers on my palms. From the flowers, I
imagine that same light permeates my whole body. It moves up my arms, through
my chest, and then splits to go up to my head and down to my lower body.
I am supposed to do this for twenty minutes, but the neighbour’s dog starts yapping and no matter how hard I try to focus on that light, my mind cannot block out the incessant barking. I put the flowers down next to me again and as I stand up, it does feel as if some of the melancholy falls away from me—not all of it though.
After I blow out the candles, I put them back on my nightstand, together with all the other multiple coloured candles. I bundle the yellow tablecloth into the washing basket and decide to leave the oil on my dresser as I notice the time.
It is time to get ready for school.
