An Eternity of Eclipse

by Con Template

  “Ahhhhhhh!”

  I lost my balance and felt my body fly in the air before landing face-first onto the ground with a loud plop!

  During my odyssey of falling from grace, I scraped my knees over the carpet and accidentally flung my bag across the room. The fall unleashed my wallet, phone, and monthly womanly essentials all throughout the room. A collective gasp reverberated in my class. Several of my classmates ran over to me and helped me up.

  While slowly sitting up to ease the black spots from my vision, several of my other classmates kindly helped gather my fallen items and put them back into my bag. I was thankful for how nice many of them were. I was also grateful the fall did not cause the lavender baby doll dress I wore to come up to my butt. The last thing I needed was to flash my thong to my male classmates. I wanted to thank God for that, but I had a feeling Eclipse, being as possessive as he was, wouldn’t allow any part of my body—much less my butt—to be showcased to anyone but himself. This was the primary reason why I knew, I just knew, he was behind all of this.

  Needless to say, as my classmates handed me my bag and helped me stand up, I was too mortified to stay in class any longer. They were all nice, but I knew what they were thinking: “That’s what she gets for wearing heels and running in them. What an idiot.” Too embarrassed to be in the classroom any longer, I thanked everyone and sped out of class.

  The only thought in my mind was that I wanted to kill that goddamn Demon of Lust!

  “Eclipse! Eclipse, where the hell are you, you mean, mean person?!” I hissed, running into the girl’s bathroom in search of him.

  In scary movies, the bad guy always hid in the bathroom stall while the beautiful, victimized girl was staring into the mirror broodingly, wondering to herself how she came upon this misfortune in her life. I figured since it appeared that I was the beautiful, victimized girl in this scenario, the perfect place to look for the bad guy was the girls’ bathroom. Unfortunately for me, my life was not written as the script of a cliché scary movie.

  Eclipse was not standing in the bathroom and waiting for me as I had anticipated.

  Wanting to make sure I was thorough (and pissed off enough to take out my anger on inanimate objects), I dramatically kicked down all the stall doors to ensure that the devious Demon wasn’t hiding and laughing at me for not being able to find him.

  My first mistake was kicking down the doors with my heels on because I pulled my leg muscle in the process. My second mistake was kicking the door down to the last stall because there was someone inside—it just wasn’t the Demon I was looking for. It was some random girl using the bathroom for official toilet business.

  “Ahhhh!” she screamed when the stall door flashed open, giving me the shock of my life. She covered her eyes in fear that I was going to beat the living daylights out of her.

  “Oh my God! I am so sorry!” I cried in apology, nearly falling over when the stall door creaked in a pendulum motion, still reeling from the momentum of my kick.

  Beyond stunned, I thanked the fates that she was covering her eyes so that she didn’t see my face. With several mutterings of apologies and several bows of regret for the trauma I bequeathed unto her, I ran my ass out of the bathroom.

  Holy shit, holy shit.

  I couldn’t believe I had just done that.

  Afraid that the newly victimized girl would come after me with the authorities, I accelerated my running speed. I sped through the thinning traffic of students in the business school building like a neurotic bat out of Hell. I had planned on going into another girls’ bathroom to search for Eclipse. However, when I saw the clock read 9:35 A.M., my eyes expanded in dismay.

  My Entrepreneurial Finance class had started at 9:30. Professor Post was notorious for marking off points for students who were tardy to class. Alarm whipped through me. Screw finding Eclipse! I had to get to class.

  Making a vengeful mental note to deal with the evil Demon later, I was already running out the door when—

  Whooooosh!

  “Oh! Oh my frigging flying pigs!” I shrieked once I was greeted with the thrashing of rain and wind.

  With the rainstorm attacking my face and completely soaking my clothes, I struggled to dig an umbrella from my bag. I whipped it out with the intention of protecting myself against the rain. I didn’t even get an opportunity to use it when a big gust of wind came and turned the umbrella inside out, rendering it useless.

  “Are you kidding me?” I cried out, wanting to break the umbrella apart. I groaned to myself and continued to fight through the rain. I ran with the sorry-excuse-for-an-umbrella flapping around uselessly while I did my best to maneuver onto the sidewalk. I was thinking that my day couldn’t get any worse when a car came speeding by, conveniently running over a puddle of newly formed mud water.

  Splash!

  I was drenched.

  I was completely drenched from head to toe.

  Muddy filth dripped down my hair, tattooed my once beautiful dress, and polluted my once flawless white heels.

  I felt like shit and as much as I hated to admit it, I looked like shit as well.

  I hate my life.

  Crestfallen while wind and rain continued to inundate me with their wickedness, I glumly picked up my feet and continued onwards to class. My lower lip quivered as I tried not to think about how ugly and pathetic I looked.

  “I hate you. I hate you so much,” I whispered as Eclipse’s flawless face crossed my mind.

  Ironically, the only part of me that was utterly void of mud was my F-paper. Sparkly clean with no blemish whatsoever, this cursed project of mine was the only thing that continued to beam with pride as I miserably trudged all the way to class.

  My mind cursed the Demon for the hell he was putting me through. I knew it even then that Eclipse was just getting started. My horrible day was far from over.

  ●●●

  Bad luck followed me the entire day.

  In classes, my professors seemed to have an affinity for picking on me to answer the hardest questions that no undergraduate student would be able to answer. They also had a habit of calling me up to complete equations in class that I just couldn’t solve because I wasn’t frigging Albert Einstein. They made me feel like an idiot, and to their credit, they succeeded; I had never felt more incompetent in my life. To make matters worse, I couldn’t for the life of me control the coordination of my own two feet!

  Throughout the day, I couldn’t stop falling on my face, tripping on my feet, and slipping on my butt. I had acquired so many bruises that one would think I had just came back from a battle in World War III. Big gushes of wind were also unleashed my way, causing discarded soda cans, candy wrappers, and big ugly bugs to come flying at my face. Ew much?

  I was granted reprieve when I went to work at the library. I couldn’t imagine what else Eclipse could have in store for me for the remainder of the day, but I was thankful to be away from the rain and away from flying objects that could attack my face. I was relieved initially, but the greeting I received once I walked into work was making me think twice about my supposed “relief.”

  “Grace! What on earth happened to you?!”

  Sitting at the front of the circulation desk with her jaw hung low and her eyes gaping at me from above the library’s flat-screen computer monitor was Ara.

  Aside from being my mentor and buddy at school, Ara was also the reason why I got the job as a student assistant at the graduate library of my university. Having worked at the library throughout her undergraduate years, Ara was promoted to student supervisor and was in charge of managing the student assistants. Since she knew that I was looking for a job to kill time and to make some extra money, Ara encouraged me to apply for the job. She said that the patrons here (being students as well) were easy to deal with. The majority spent their time studying and very rarely bothered anyone. She also said that during the slow times, we were also allowed to study and do homework. That tidbit was all that it took to convince me to apply and sure
enough, with Ara’s highest recommendation to the hiring manager, I was offered the student assistant job right after my interview.

  Judging from her waning excited demeanor, I imagined she wanted to gossip with me about her day. After seeing my unkempt appearance, gossiping seemed to be the last thing on her mind.

  “Bad day,” I replied sullenly, aware of how hideous I must have looked to receive that type of reaction from Ara. She normally gushed over my sense of style. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  After being submerged in filthy crap all day, I embarrassingly went to class and endured countless stares from bewildered classmates. I honestly never wanted to crawl under a hole and die more in my life. Once class was finally over, I ran to the bathroom and did my best to clean up. It was futile because the mud stains seemed to have been mixed with industrial strength super-glue. No matter how hard I scrubbed, the vast majority of the mud still clung to me, hanging on me like leeches hell-bent on making sure I experienced nothing but embarrassment for the duration of the day.

  I had no time to go home to change because I was too responsible to ditch my obligations to school and work. After seeing Ara’s reaction, I was beginning to hate myself for being so responsible and dependable. If there was a day to be selfish and ditch my responsibilities, today was it.

  Nodding her head while students passed us by, staring at me like I was a hobo off the street, Ara was considerate enough to adhere to my wish to not talk about it.

  She angled her head towards the stacks of books on the rolling cart behind her. “I was going to stack the books back in their place when you came in, but I could watch the front desk. Do you want to go to the back and categorize them instead? You can just stay there and make sure all the books are in order until your shift is over.”

  I smiled appreciatively at her, grateful that I didn’t have to sit up front like I usually did during my shifts. With a whispered thanks and an air hug to her, I quickly ran to the cart. I wheeled the cart away in haste so that no one else would see me in this awful state. Anger returned to me when the stupid cheap cart wouldn’t stop squealing as I moved towards the row of bookshelves in the back. Students who were studying stared at me with gaping eyes. Fortunately, I was able to escape quickly and get lost in the back before anyone else could look up from their books and judge me for my unfortunate appearance.

  Finally. I’m finally alone.

  While standing on a ladder and categorizing books into the correct order, I felt peace settle upon me. I was grateful that I’d be able to hide my unkempt appearance from the rest of the library patrons until my shift was over. I only had to hold out for a little while longer before I could go home, shower, and end my horrible day on a somewhat relaxing note.

  “Gracie . . .”

  The sound of his voice ruined my momentary serenity.

  Fury blazed in my eyes when I looked down and saw him beside me. Standing on the steps of the ladder, my petite 5’2” height was elevated to the point where I was actually slightly taller than his 6-foot frame. Because of this slight height advantage, it made me feel like a big, bad monster compared to him.

  “You,” I snarled, baring my teeth at him.

  After a long day of cursing his name and rehearsing in my mind all the things I wanted to scream at him, I couldn’t believe that when the actual opportunity arose for me to give him a piece of my mind, all that I could come up with was, “You.”

  It was anticlimactic, but I was too angry. I couldn’t even string together the words to scream at him!

  “Oh, come on, Gracie,” he replied, already knowing what I was so upset about. Smoke escaped from his lips when he said this. He was still dressed in the same outfit I saw him in earlier and he looked as spiffy and polished as ever. Such perfection made me angrier because it only reminded me of my disheveled appearance. “It’s not that big of a deal.”

  “An F!” I shrieked, nearly falling off the ladder. He spent the whole day screwing up my luck and he had the audacity to make it seem like I was overreacting? I picked up the cursed project and waved it in his face. “You gave me an F! Do you know how hard I worked on this project? I pulled three all-nighters for it!”

  I angrily threw the project on the floor and plowed on with my rant, scowling at him with fire in my eyes.

  “Not only that, you also tortured me by making me trip the entire day!” My lips quivered when I gestured at my overall outer appearance. “And you had a car drive by and splash mud all over me. Look at me! I look like a pig who rolled around in mud all day!”

  Although a hint of guilt splashed across his face when I mentioned the mud incident, it wasn’t enough to throw him over the edge with remorse.

  “Trust me, Gracie. It could be worse,” he placated soothingly, helping me categorize the books by picking up some hardcovers from the rolling cart and putting them in the correct order on the lower shelves.

  “Nothing seems worse than my bleak future,” I replied resentfully, grabbing the books from him. I didn’t need him to pretend to be nice to me when he was the one making me miserable in the first place.

  “You’re being horribly overdramatic,” he went on calmly. He stared up at me, inhaling the last of his diminishing cigarette before flicking it into a nearby trashcan. He then vested his full attention on me. “You have no idea the things other Demons would do to persuade humans into giving up their souls. The vast majority are heartless, uncaring of the welfare of the humans they are after. All they care about is making you so miserable that you want nothing more than to end it and beg for them to take your soul. As far as I’m concerned, what I’m doing isn’t even remotely close to the type of misery I could bring upon you.”

  “It doesn’t matter if it could be worse,” I snapped, not having any of it. I would not let him feel better about himself by making it seem like he was the lesser of two evils. “The point is that none of this would be happening if it wasn’t for your interference in my life.”

  “Give me your soul and I’ll stop everything at once,” he countered, his voice stern. “I won’t worsen anything.”

  “Go to Hell!”

  “I know it may not seem like it, but I’m suffering just as much as you are,” he whispered, noting the unforgiving daggers in my eyes. “All you have to do is agree and both our miseries can end.”

  I gaped at him dryly. “How are you suffering as much as me?”

  A disbelieving expression spread over his face. He looked at me as though it should be obvious why he would be miserable.

  “I know that this may come as a surprise to you, Gracie, but I do have responsibilities. I’m actually a very busy Royal Demon. Since I’m trying not to kill you, I have to dim myself, thereby making me less powerful than I actually am. I can handle stepping out of my Kingdom for you because I look forward to being around you. Nevertheless, as I’m sure you’ve figured out from my cocky personality, I happen to like my powers. I do not appreciate still being a Dimmed Demon just because you’re stubborn. So yes, I’m suffering as much as you, and I would very much appreciate you ending this misery for us by just saying ‘yes’ to me.”

  “I’m not giving you my soul, you evil Demon!” I shouted, wishing that I could jump off the ladder and kick him. “I hope you’re suffering a lot because I’ve never been this miserable in my life. I’m going to keep my soul and I will enjoy watching you suffer without your powers just to spite you. I don’t care what you do or how you try to convince me, I’m not giving you anything!”

  He laughed self-mockingly, shaking his head at my stubbornness.

  “God help me. It would make sense that I’m cursed with you, Gracie,” he muttered sourly to himself. “How can a human girl be this stubborn?”

  “How can an all-powerful Demon be this thickheaded and stupid as to pick on a poor, innocent girl?”

  He looked at me blankly when I described myself as “innocent.”

  “You murdered your own family when you were six,” he deadpanned.


  I glared at him, furious that he'd low-blow me with a crime I committed when I was barely old enough to remember it.

  “I really hate you right now. I hope you know it.”

  He smiled in disappointment at my retort. Knowing that any further interaction with me at the current time would be futile, he yielded with his efforts.

  “I think it’s best if I leave you alone now, Gracie.”

  I appraised him suspiciously. Something in the way he said that made me uncomfortable in the most chilling of ways. He was up to something.

  “Why?” I inquired. My alert eyes locked with his. “What are you planning to do to me now?”

  He gave me one of the most innocent expressions I had ever seen in my life. It could have melted the heart of the most evil witch. Other girls would see this and fall head over heels for him, but I knew better. An innocent expression from Eclipse did not mean reassurance—it meant trouble.

  True to my assumption, without warning, Eclipse casually lifted his right hand. He rested the palm of his hand flat against the shelf, and to my horror, gave the towering bookshelf the single most powerful push I had ever seen.

  Oh no.

  As the gigantic bookshelf began to tilt, adhering to his very will for it to no longer stand its ground, Eclipse gave me an apologetic smile and disappeared into thin air, leaving me to deal with the chaos to come.

  Shit.

  Horror clutched me as I watched everything in slow motion.

  Oh shit.

  Boom!

  Boom!

  Boom!

  Shelf after shelf fell upon one another like dominos, thundering to the ground as a tsunami of books splashed across the carpet with the fervor of wet paint. The sound was destructive and utterly attention grabbing. An ominous silence followed, along with a cloud of dust mirroring that of an atomic bomb. The destruction may have been done, but the aftermath was just beginning.