Charlie Cradle's Wonderful Existence: A Novella

by Scott J. Callaway

  Chapter 8

  Charlie dedicated the next day to do some hardcore gaming, as she liked to call it. After spending some more time with Rowan last night, continually being impressed and amazed by all the little tricks he would perform, she had an itch to play her online game that wouldn’t be satisfied until she did. She needed to log into her wizard character and start razzle-dazzling some monsters with some major firepower. Rowan’s magic had not only filled with her awe, but it also brought out her inner geek who desired to cast a few spells of her own.

  Charlie was always this way. Whenever she watched martial arts movies, she wanted to run out on the street and start kicking and punching people, performing sick backflips and wall jumps and maybe even stop a mugger. When she watched inspirational movies, she wanted to stop world hunger or change the world in some other positive way. And when she watched anything to do with magic or sorcery, she always ran to her online gaming world to lay down the law with her level sixty fire mage.

  Charlie and Rowan must have walked around the park last night for what felt like hours, just talking about what it was like to be a wizard and a little more about his life. And while she played her video game, slaying monsters and saving citizens in distress, she replayed the things that they talked about over and over again in her mind.

  “Have you always been a wizard?” asked Charlie. “Like, were you born from a magical family and then taken to wizard school at the appropriate age like Harry Potter, or is it something you learned and kept practicing at?”

  “Magic has always been a part of who I am,” said Rowan. “Although in recent years while I’ve been traveling, I’ve been trying to keep it on the down low for the most part.”

  “How come? Does it have something to do with Roxy? You still haven’t properly explained to me why a bounty hunter is interested in you. You’re positive you’re not a criminal right?”

  “Positive,” said Rowan, laughing, and this time Charlie genuinely believed him, “although, that story is a little bit more complicated to explain. But what I can tell is that I believe Roxy’s determination to catch me may be fueled by something a bit more than just the law.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Charlie, even if she felt like she already knew the answer.

  “It was a long time ago, but there was a time when we used to date. It was never anything serious. I found her to be a bit… extreme, to put things lightly. And unfortunately for me, she’s not exactly satisfied with how things ended between us. That’s what I get for dating a bounty hunter.”

  “I see,” said Charlie, feeling sort of awkward but understanding what he meant when he labeled her as extreme. She definitely had zeal for her job.

  “But don’t worry over her too much,” said Rowan, sensing her apprehension, “she’s been after me for longer than I’d care to admit, but I’ve been pretty good at keeping at bay. That’s why I’ve opted to call myself the traveling wizard. It’s either I move around a lot, or else she eventually gets too close. Not exactly the ideal lifestyle, but I don’t have much of a choice. I’m still trying to find a way to change all that.”

  Charlie thought about how he phrased his sentence. It sounded to her like he meant that he moved around from place to place in order to keep his distance. So did that mean he would eventually have to leave her for a different city in order to evade Roxy as well? Charlie knew that in the grand scope of things, they had just only met and things weren’t that serious. But even so, she had already begun to really like him. No one had ever taken interest in her before. However much she knew how necessary it was for him to leave if he wished not to be captured by Roxy for whatever law he’d broken, she would be sad if he left.

  “Why did you give me your email if you knew it would only tip her off to where you are?” asked Charlie, annoyed that because of it they risked spending less time together.

  “Because it’s less risky that way,” said Rowan. “Magical people have the innate ability to sense other magical people through the things they do. If I had used a phone, the energy of my voice would have helped her narrow in on my position a lot quicker. Using email is still almost as risky, but it’s harder to track since I’m just pushing buttons. I knew that if you opened my email, then Roxy would have checked out your place instead of mine.”

  “Gee, thanks for that.”

  “I’m sorry! I couldn’t think of a better way. It’s pretty frustrating. It’s like leaving a magical fingerprint no matter what I do.”

  “Exactly what law have you broken, anyway? Isn’t there a fine you can pay that will let you off the hook?”

  “Like I said, that’s the complicated part. I hate to hide anything from you… but it has to do with the laws of magic and the people who govern them. I’m just afraid that the more you know, the more difficult things might become for you. Can you trust me for this once?”

  Charlie didn’t want to say yes. She wanted to hear the truth in all its painful glory. But at the last moment, that frightened person who she had lived as all her life that wished for nothing to be complicated screamed in her ear and urged her to let the matter rest. Security and predictability. Those were what had always won in the past, and it would win on this day as well.

  “Well… I guess,” she said, dejectedly.

  “Thanks, Charlie,” said Rowan, reaching for her hand to hold in his own and squeezing it reassuringly. “If things ever settle down for me, I promise that I will one day explain everything.”

  Charlie enjoyed the warmth of his hand in hers and she smiled back at him.

  “Have you ever had a conversation with a swan?” asked Rowan, attempting to change the mood of the situation.

  “You can do that?” asked Charlie, excitedly.

  “Well, I’ve only ever tried this spell on a duck, but it shouldn’t be that much different.”

  The little excited little girl inside of Charlie squealed with excitement and they both raced off toward the pond to talk to a swan. Rowan had shown her a lot of neat little tricks, but that was by far the coolest one yet.

  Now that Charlie was playing her game, where she just turned a charging Minotaur into a penguin using one of her transformation spells, she remembered that she forgot to ask Rowan about one very specific thing that Roxy had said. She had gotten so caught up with all the fancy, amazing magic he was doing that she had forgotten about everything else. And she couldn’t blame herself for it, really. Who else ever gets to learn that magic was actually real? Wizards and spells were part of fairy tales, and she felt like she was now living one. It was amazing. But what did Roxy mean when she called her a mortal? She really wished she would have remembered to bring it up. It was something she would definitely need to ask the next time she saw him.

  And that brought up another important topic of which they discussed later in the night. How were they going to contact each other if using a phone or email put psycho lady bounty hunter on their trail? In the end, Charlie gave Rowan her address and before they parted ways, they agreed to seeing each other again that night since it was Charlie’s last day off before returning to work. After that, depending on what kind of schedule her boss gave her for missing so much time, she wasn’t sure when she’d be able to see him again.

  So Charlie satisfied herself that day with adventuring in her online reality as much as possible. Then, after spending all of her morning and much of the afternoon questing and obliterating goblins and ogres, just as she was about to log off and get ready for her second date with Rowan, a message flashed on her screen, notifying her that Tom’s character, Vinland, had come online. She hadn’t talked to him for the past few days and thought she would stay on a while longer to chat before leaving.

  “Hey,” said Tom.

  “Hey Vin!” said Charlie.

  “How’s it going? I haven’t seen you on for days. You missed last night’s guild run… and guess what dropped?”

  “No! Don’t tell me!”

  “Yep, afraid so. The Bow of Lesser Destruction. DUN
! DUN! DUN!!!!!!!”

  “WHY?!?!?!?!” typed Charlie, then banging a fist on her computer desk.

  “Fortune doth not shine upon thee.”

  “Of course it would drop on the night I’ve gone out.”

  “You actually went outside?” said Tom. “The infamous hermit, Charlie the Wood Elf Ranger, has actually seen what streetlamps look like past sundown?”

  “Hey, I do work late sometimes you know! And occasionally the night calls for snacks.”

  “I applaud you taking your first steps into experiencing the outside world. What happened? Did a fire force everyone from your building to get out for a while?”

  “Watch it or I’ll turn you into a penguin.”

  “LOL! I’m just teasing. I’m sure the guild will make another run for it if you want. But really, what got you out?”

  “Well, if you must know,” said Charlie. “I kind of met a guy the other day.”

  “Oh? Well that’s cool.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Is it serious?” asked Tom. “I mean, you sound like you’re dating.”

  “Um, we’re just getting to know each other right now. We’ve gotten together a couple of times and we’re going out again tonight.”

  “Ah. So I guess I won’t see you online tonight either. But I hope you have fun. You deserve it.”

  Charlie wanted to tell Tom all about Rowan. She was almost bursting at the seams holding within her the incredible secret she had learned. She wanted to tell him that magic was real! That she had seen amazing things happen and that spells and wizardry wasn’t only confined to their online characters. But Rowan had mentioned how he was trying to keep his magic on the down low. Even if he hadn’t directly told her not to tell anybody, she would feel like she somehow betrayed his trust if she did. And at that moment while talking to Tom, something else also picked at her. She knew she must have only been imagining it, because their friendship had never gone beyond what it was, but did Tom seem concerned?

  “Thanks Vin,” said Charlie. “Anyway, I better log out. I need to get ready. One of these nights when I’m off work again, we’ll definitely need to put in some game time together!”

  “I’m looking forward to it,” said Tom. “Have fun.”

  With a few swift clicks of her mouse, Charlie was logged out and she set off to get ready. This was going to be her second official date with Rowan. A real date this time, in a real restaurant, with no LOLcats involved. She also made sure Rowan chose a place where she was certain she wouldn’t run into anyone she knew. She didn’t want to go through another experience like she did with Lisette. So Charlie busied herself for the rest of the afternoon preparing for what she hoped was going to be another magical date. Quite literally. But more than once, she thought about her conversation with Tom and hoped that even though he put on a happy face, he wasn’t secretly upset. She was normally pretty clueless when it came to translating social implications, but she had known Tom long enough now to know that he wasn’t acting his normal self. But for now, deciding not to let it interfere with her upcoming night with Rowan, Charlie let it go and continued with getting ready.

  She hoped Rowan’s choice of restaurant served burgers and fries.