I moseyed out of my fourth period, and Mrs. O’Neil was cool with it. She understood I was harmless, a wild, creative mind wandering or going to find my friends for lunch. Shout out to all the teachers who get it; not all of us kids fit in the box.

“Hey,” We both said in almost the same sad cadence as Nezami exited her class.

“You wanted to talk?" I asked, my curiosity overwhelming like a fountain inside.

"Oh, it's not that big of a deal. We can talk tonight after school at your house," she replied nervously. She clearly wasn’t ready to have this chat either.

"Yeah, okay," I responded with a touch of sarcasm. "So you've had me sitting in anxiety all day, like, 'Oh my gosh, what does she have to tell me that’s so important.' I try to come over here so we can be alone before all the other hooligans join us for lunch, and now you're telling me it's not a big deal?" I continued with a raised eyebrow and crossed arms.

"So you know the art classes I attend after school," Nezami began.

"Yeah, of course. Why?"

"Well, I met this graphic design kid there. He's a year older than me from the high school,"

I knew where this was heading. I had harbored feelings for her for as long as I could remember; our friendship was too important. However, I couldn't help but feel a sting or maybe disappointment. "So you started dating a guy?" My voice held a hint of lost hope.

"What are we chirping about over here, love birds?" Robbie interjected, putting his arm around both of us.

"Well, Nez was telling me about this guy she started dating. What was his name again?" I said, feigning ignorance.

"Did you go and get yourself a boyfriend?" Robbie asked, affecting a funny accent as he playfully tightened his arm around her head. Nezami swatted his arm away.

“Robbie, the hair seriously! Yeah, a boy I met in my art class," she confirmed.

"Ohh, fancy. He's an artist, huh?" Robbie replied.

"And also, I didn't tell you his name… ‘My Lord,’” she said, mimicking Mika’s voice at me.

"Ohh, I love this game," Robbie said, amused. I couldn't help but chuckle.

"Well," she continued, "his uncle owns a bunch of stuff, and he works for him."

"Ohh my gosh, is it that Malachi kid?" Robbie exclaimed, coming to a sudden stop. A flicker of recognition passed through my mind.

"Yes, Robbie. As a matter of fact, his name is Gan," Nezami said, her tone steady. There was something significant about this; I could feel it.

“For real, Nez?? The BMX Kid? That's just gross,” Robbie said, very dismayed.

Nez didn't even respond. She stood there, almost awestruck at his opinion. Shaking his head, he put his arm around the disassociated me. "Dude, that kid rides BMX,” Robbie said, looking down at me.

"Well, then, I got dibs on her deck when she gets rid of it for a bike,” I said, walking forward, the two of us leaving Nezami behind us. I didn’t like it one bit. I had always been comfortable enough to joke out of an uncomfortable situation. But it didn't mean my brain wasn't still processing it as I walked up the remaining stairs to the lunch room.

Walking into the lunchroom, Yaj was already sitting at the table; his parents packed his lunch daily. Yaj, with his reading aptitude, was halfway through some book. And if left alone, he would finish it before lunchtime was over.

I stared at my friend, jokingly thinking he probably didn’t even read these books. He does it to look cool. Yaj looked at me with a face, a face prompting me to leave my friends in line for lunch.

“So, I remembered something about one of your grandma's books, and I went into the library and grabbed it. Go get your food. I'll tell you when you come to sit down,” Yaj said, still piecing together his thoughts.

"It's all good; I’m not even that hungry. I'm still full from the breakfast sandwich,” I replied.

"In the second volume of the Magic Lantern series, your grandma advises the young—presumably you at the time—to find the lantern if it ever went missing. That's where the power came from,” Yaj shared with a sparkle in his eyes.

"Right, was the only way actually to see them versus the ‘flash’ of dark. If you could carry the lantern, it made them more visible even though it was more like fooling your mind," I said.

"Exactly! But I think she meant you needed to summon the lantern; I don’t think it’s a real object. At least, I assume that's what she meant. It's like you've got this natural knack for it," Yaj added.

"What, like I can summon some kind of superpower?"

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“Hell, I don't know, man. That'd be sweet, though,” Yaj said.

“What would be sweet?” Nezami asked, sitting across from me without making eye contact. Nezami didn't sit in her usual spot right next to me; she sat defiantly across from me. She was mad, for sure.

“It'd be sweet if I had a superpower,” I responded.

“OH, trust me, you already have a superpower. It’s being an asshole,” Nezami stated.

"Oh, my Arcadia, I didn't ask your boyfriend's name. I'm sorry,” I responded.

“Boyfriend!!!” Yaj exclaimed. “Who could be good enough for ‘The Dark enchantress’ herself?” Yaj responded, using her gamer handle instead of her name.

"The Malakai kid,” Robbie said before Nez could respond, fitting his large man body under a kid’s table.

"Wow,” Yaj responded, not breaking eye contact with me.

Roxy surprised us by sitting at the table, getting too close for comfort. She always made me feel tingly, but she was a wild child, and Robbie was smitten with her. Roxy and Nezami exchanged funny remarks, keeping things lively.

"Well, good for you, girl. I'm impressed." Roxy said.

"Girls are funny like this sometimes," I thought, waiting to see where this goes.

Nezami, irritated, replied, "Yeah? Impressed how?" with a sprinkle of snark in her tone.

“I’ve been best friends with Athena since we were little, and I didn’t even know until we talked this morning,” Roxy responded.

“Well, it wasn’t official until last night.”

“Ouch,” I thought but kept it to myself and maintained my regular face.

“Didn’t his parents move away?" Yaj asked.

"Yeah, they moved away. It was something about their family building on another port on the other island. But the schools are better here,” Nezami added.

My father had been working for the Malakai company for a while; they were repairing an old port. Gan’s parents had taken the construction duties on the island of Sisten, a few hours’ boat ride away. Maybe that's how I knew him, perhaps from work parties I attended with my father. "Okay," I thought, "yeah, that's gotta be it,” I mumbled aloud.

"What's it?" Roxy said, leaning on my shoulder.

"Oh, nothing. Sorry. I was thinking out loud," I responded, almost embarrassed.

"Okay, well, I'm going to go get food. But that's awesomeness. He's a cool dude," Roxy said, getting up.

Mika took the spot where Roxy had been, her head slumped over, making a statement without saying anything.

"You okay, Mika?" I asked.

"I can't believe that there was social gossip, and I missed it," she said, as if she was dying. Putting my arm around her, hoping to irritate Nezami a little more, I said, "Ohh, there, there. It's okay, love. I will tell you all the gossip."

"Not so forgiven now?" I thought arrogantly, slightly amusing myself.

"So when do we get to meet him?" Mika asked.

"Well, it sounds like none of you want to meet him," Nezami responded.

"You're a smart girl, Nez. You probably know something we don't, and we're probably just sitting here passing judgment," Robbie said, sounding like his father.

Yaj, who had lost interest in the conversation minutes before, continued with what he was reading. He slid the book over to my elbow and pointed to a diagram.

"See that?" Yaj said.

"The watchtower," I responded. "What is that book?" I asked.

"It's a book on the town and its history that I got from the library," Yaj responded.

"How the heck could you find that?" I asked though I shouldn't have had to.

"Photographic memory," Yaj said, pointing to his head. "I was like, I swear I remembered something from your grandma's book."

"That's the watchtower. Where she found the Lantern," I said, looking at it more closely.

"Yes, but the lantern was the ‘lamp to your feet and a light to your path,’ so it led to the magical cabin. It was the only way you could face the shadows," Yaj responded.

"Well, the secret cabin is in her backyard. I have been there hundreds of times and gained no powers.”

"Did you even read into your grandma's books?" Yaj said, almost accusatory.

"Yeah, I read some of them, but I was there when we made the story, so I knew what would happen," I said, embarrassed.

"You should feel embarrassed," Yaj said, realizing I was. Clearly showing his dismay, he continued. “Anyway, the books help you find the cabin’s direction by the watchtower’s lantern. Because you aren’t safe in the story until you find the cabin. There is a marker of some sort. But you have to find the lantern first.”

“Do they have a copy of her book in the library?”

“I’m sure they do. Let's go there real quick. They probably have a trail map in one of the hiking books, too,” Yaj said as he crumpled up his paper bag and stood up.

“What do we need a trail map for?” I asked seriously, not knowing what he was doing in that brain.

“The map to where the cabin might be, duh?” He responded, leaving the table without saying anything to anyone. Following suit, I headed to the lunchroom door and looked back briefly, feeling guilty that I got up so abruptly and left. She was staring at me; I couldn’t tell if it was hurt or pissed. But I just gave her the best face I could, trying to express that I hoped she knew it was just boyhood jealousy.

Yaj was onto something, and I knew she didn’t necessarily believe what was going on with me. “For the first time as far as I can remember,” I thought honestly, bummed out.

The library was in the open area in the main building. The original layout of the school must have used this foyer as a lunchroom, but now it was rows of waist-high blue shelves packed with books.

"Scour the hiking section first for a local trail guide; we should find a map booklet first,” I suggested. I had many copies of my grandma’s book at my house, and it’s not like we could explore beyond the watchtower right now anyway. But with barely 10 minutes of lunch to go, having a trail map of where some of the trails might go would be useful. I could already smell the adventure, and I love a good adventure.

"OK, here's one," Yaj said, pulling it out and setting it on an upright viewing table between some bookshelves. The watchtower was a monument so that a local trail guide would have a map of potential trails from there. Tourists frequented our island because of the vast fjords and mountainscapes. Most of the place was a photographer's dream. But Shadow Wood was a dense forest, and one can easily get lost in it.

As Yaj flipped it open, searching the index for a page showing where the trailhead was. "See this area here? These are the trails that all connect to where the watchtower is.”

The trails were like spider webs from a few distinct locations, either from a remaining chunk of the old wall or at the half dozen watchtowers. The city had left them intact for use as markers, even though many of the sections were streets and neighborhoods now.

"Hey, you know, we could do this today. It's not far, and we could check off trails we follow on this map,” Yaj said.

"You do know it sounds kind of stupid, right?”

“No, it doesn’t sound stupid. I still have a belief in the unseen, and I don’t need the drugs for imaginary adventures. The adventures of childhood are still so vivid to me," Yaj responded.

"OK, meet me at hulio after whatever club you're in this week," I joked, sticking the trail map book in my backpack.

“Aren't you going to check that out?" Yaj asked.

"No, no one's here, and I’m sure I have fines,” I responded as we walked out of the library area.