THE NEXT DAY (FRIDAY, OCTOBER 8, 2021)

WEST VILLAGE, MANHATTAN, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES

The following day was a slow burn. She taught her class, graded a ton of terrible exams, and then was supposed to go out. For once, it wasn’t with Charlie but an actual date. A film grad student had asked her out a while ago, after meeting her through Jade, and they were finally getting to it… he was a cute, lanky guy named Jae-Young, or Johnny as he went by. Even though Ella didn’t use her Indian name, she figured she would start with Jae-Young and see if he corrected her.

Her roommate flopped over on her bed, eyeing the clothes that Ella was laying out.

“You have no idea do you? That outfit…” pointing to the outfit on Ella’s left, “is way too slutty. And that one is like you are a nice Catholic girl like me, saving yourself for marriage.” Her smirk belied that last statement.

Ella resisted the easy target Jade had just painted on her back and picked out a third outfit.

Later that night she was sitting at a table, and the maitre d’ brought over Jae-Young who took off a pumpkin-colored tweed jacket and hung it over the back of the chair before turning to face her. He froze, and stared right into her eyes as his face went pale.

“Ella?” He stumbled back a bit and then grabbed his coat. “I am so sorry,” he said as he ran out of the restaurant.

Ella sat there stunned. What the hell was that? Should I be offended?

She pulled out her compact to take a look and everything looked okay until she realized - she had forgotten to put in her contacts. And more importantly, Jae-Young had seen something. She got up, threw down a twenty for the untouched glass of wine and raced out the door.

Bursting onto the sidewalk outside of the restaurant, she spotted his distinctive sport coat. She followed him as he walked quickly, constantly looking back over his shoulder. When he spotted her he started walking / half-running through the early evening crowd. It would have been comical, a 6’1 guy running away from a petite 5’7 woman in obvious fear, if it was not so strange.

She just went to a full on sprint, glad she hadn’t bothered with heels and weaving through the evening foot traffic with reckless abandon.

“Stop following me,” he called back, “I don’t want anything to do with this!”

“Hold on one sec!” She cried back, a bit out of breath. Not worrying about all the curious looks she was getting.

He took off at a full run, looking back every so often, and Ella wasn’t sure she could keep up. At least until he crashed straight into a street cafe chair and bounced off of it — a seat back that was just about at groin height. It was obvious what had happened as he rolled around on the ground in pain, both his hands covering his crotch.

Stolen story; please report.

Ella stood over him for a moment before sighing a bit and helping him up and into the chair he had just crashed into. A waiter came over to check on them, and Jae-Young waved them away after taking a moment.

Once they had been left alone for a moment, Jae-Young said under his breath, “Look, I am sorry I ran away. Please don’t hurt me…” his pleading voice made Ella take a moment.

“Hurt you? I am not going to hurt you. This was supposed to be a date, and you took off like I was a horror show…” she paused for a moment, “this is about my eyes, isn’t it? What is going on?”

He glanced around to make sure nobody was looking. “You don’t know… do you? How curious…” He paused for a moment, “Yeah… your eyes gave it away, and also that glowing crown you are wearing.”

Ella’s hands went to her hair, where there was no crown.

Jae-Young’s eyes got even wider, and, if anything, a look of pity started appearing. “I-ah, don’t even know how to start.” He looked around the restaurant patio a bit, making sure the other tables weren’t looking at them. “Look at my face and don’t freak out.”

Ella looked right at him, and jumped a bit when his face changed. It was still the same face, but a bit narrower, his eyes angled diagonally a bit out of the human norm, his cheekbones became sharper and more pronounced, and his ears were long and somewhat pointed. It lasted just for a moment, and then it changed back.

“What are you?” she asked. “Who are you?”

He took a moment, “My name is Jae-Young Park, just like I told you. I was born in Busan, and all the rest. It is just that… well, I have an ancestor that is a bit unusual. My parents are totally normal, my two sisters, normal. Only my grandfather knew what was going on, as his mother was like me… A throwback.”

Ella had already seen crazier things, so she was able to repeat to herself “roll with it”. Two deep breaths, “A throwback to what, exactly?”

“Well… In Korea, maybe they would think I was a dokkaebi, a kind of mischievous fairy creature. But it isn’t really that.”

They paused for a moment as a waiter came by to check on them, and Ella went ahead and ordered an appetizer to get the waiter out of their way.

“My great-grandmother was… well… an elf from Iceland. Or part elf anyway, like me.” he flushed a bit and his eyes were down, embarrassed. “She gave me this ring that disguises me, which she had from her father, and apparently, it has been passed down forever.” The ring he pointed to was a thin band, hidden right in front of the class ring he had on his right ring finger, silver in color, with fine engraving. As she looked at it, she noticed it had a bit of that weight, that extra reality, the same as she had experienced at the castle and party.

Jae-Young interrupted her thoughts, “Reach up and feel your hair now.”

She did, and she could feel a bit of resistance, as if something was sitting on her head, but not, as if the air was thick and viscous. She wanted to feel it better and focused a bit more.

“Close your eyes!” Jae-Young hissed under his breath. “Your eyes are lighting up like flashlights.”

That snapped her right out of it, the crown vanished from her touch.

“I had a dream… no, it wasn’t a dream.,” Ella started and paused, stumbling over telling anyone what had happened, because to truly acknowledge it would be taking the next step. Just roll with it. “I went down a tunnel and emerged into a castle where this creature — a king? — stabbed me with a scepter. And when I woke up the next day I had these eyes… And I have no idea what is going on.” She started crying, her eyes causing the tears to glow.

Jae-Young looked at her, sympathy obvious on his face. “I was born into this, and I don’t know much. My grandfather just told me to avoid anything strange. To run away as fast as I could.” He paused for a moment. “When I was young, I saw maybe something twice. But in the past few years, I see more and more folks like me, I catch glimpses of something, something mysterious.”

They ate dinner quietly, the burden of confession keeping them silent as they both thought about it.