Hidden Magic: An Ancient Magic Novel

by Stephany Wallace

  “Do you wish us to walk to the park today for lunch, My Goddess?”

  I almost answered yes then remembered my date. “I’m sorry I can’t. I’m having lunch with my friend Lia. Actually she must be waiting for me already,” I said absentmindedly and looked over the partition towards the hallway.

  “But you can meet me here later or at home tonight.”

  I saw Lia’s face. She approached my cubicle and I grabbed my phone quickly placing it on my ear.

  “Yes, that sounds perfect. I’ll see you later. Ok bye.” I made a play of hanging up then turned to find her standing in front of me. She smiled, knowingly.

  “Boyfriend?

  “No.”

  “Yes,” Cyn answered at the same time.

  I chuckled. “No, just a friend. Sorry I’m late. Should we go?” I asked getting up as Cyn did too. I swear his eyes were glued to my face. I briefly glanced in his direction and he winked at me. His dimple did it so much sexier.

  “Are you ready?” Lia asked pulling me back to reality.

  “Yes, sorry. Let’s go,” I grabbed my bag and followed her.

  “I will be waiting for you, my Goddess,” he said while I began to walk away. I smiled.

  *

  “I’m so glad we did this. Thanks for asking me out. I mean, not asking me out, ‘out’ like on a date, I wouldn’t date you. I mean, not that there is anything wrong with you, I’m sure you’d make a pretty awesome date. I’m just not attracted to you that way… Oh God. Are you into women? Is that why you asked me to lunch? Is this a date?”

  I laughed at Lia’s rambling. She looked at me alarmed. I shook my head. I was so relieved I was not the only crazy one around.

  She sighed. “What I meant was, thanks for inviting me to lunch.” She said embarrassed and sighed. “I quit,” she pressed her lips together to stop herself from saying anything else.

  “It’s ok, I know what you meant,” I said still laughing. “I say crazy things all the time. It’s my ‘normal,’” we carried the trays with our orders and sat on a table outside. She was sweet and a bit awkward. I liked her. She chuckled as a relieved expression crossed her face.

  “Oh thank God. I really dug myself into that one didn’t I? I just couldn’t stop.”

  We laughed as I opened my chips and took a bite.

  “I’m glad we did this too. I kind of needed someone to talk to in the office. It’s so boring most of the time.”

  “I know. I mean I’m not going to lie. I like working there, it is peaceful in a way. Unless a client calls exasperated because their case is not going well. Then I just want to hide under my desk,” we chuckled. “But otherwise I like that I’m able to do my job and no one bothers me. I like the calm to a certain point, but I have to agree with you. It’s boring sometimes in there. And I swear there are moments I wonder if there is something else going on with that firm. I mean, those people are so secretive and they always stick together. They are like a cult,” she said with a frown, looking at me like she was trying to figure me out.

  “Can I share something with you?”

  Her question was completely unexpected. I nodded. “Yes, of course what is it?” I said stuffing another chip into my mouth.

  She looked around us as to make sure there was no one listening then took a deep breath.

  “There are times when I’m sitting there, just minding my own business and a cold chill will run down my spine. It’s like there is a negative energy there. Especially when the owner, and Mrs. Smith are around. I don’t like their auras at all.”

  I frowned. “Their auras?”

  She nodded taking a huge bite of her sub. Her cheeks puffed up like a blowfish while she chewed. She nodded again and tried to swallow.

  “Yes their Auras,” she repeated. Her words barely understandable, her mouth was impossibly full.

  Man, that girl can eat.

  “Do you know what an Aura is?” I shook my head while she drank some soda then continued. “An aura is the energy that emanates from your being. It surrounds your whole body, and it always has a color,” she took another obscenely large bite. I wondered how she wasn’t choking.

  “Wow, really?” She nodded. “Huh, I never knew. Where does it come from?” I asked taking the first bite out of my sub. I was getting hungrier just by watching her eat. She had an appetite on her.

  “Well it comes from the deepest part of you. It’s like a projection of your essence outside of your body.”

  I frowned. There was that word again. “Essence,” Cyn had used it, he said he could feel my essence and I his. “What do you mean by essence?”

  She smiled. “Your essence is your soul. Your aura is a reflection of it outside your body. It’s like your signature energy. Like your fingerprint and everyone’s is different. No two auras are ever the same. It looks like a band of light around you and each of them has a color, the very rare or special ones have more than three and each color means something different.”

  I looked at her perplexed. Where had this information been all my life? It sounded like something the flower child in me would love knowing, yet I’d never heard about it before. “How do you know all this?” I asked, taking a sip of my strawberry lemonade.

  She smiled proudly. “I have a gift. I get it from my grandma. She could see auras and read them as well as some people read hands. The ability to see auras is considered a psychic skill, but it also has a lot to do with your spirituality. When you read someone’s aura it can tell you a lot about that person, who they are and their energy. Even their life path,” she explained proudly and stuffed a hand full of chips in her mouth.

  I stared at her dumbfounded. That sounded amazing.

  “Can you read them too?”

  She took a sip of her drink and wrinkled her nose. “No, not really. I can see them though, and have a very good understanding of what their colors mean. My grandma started teaching me when I was a little girl. She said the gift skips a generation so my Father couldn’t see them. I didn’t have time to learn much since my grandma died when I was six, and my Father never liked talking about it after she was gone. I think it made him sad, so I never pushed for it. But I remember what my grandma taught me, and I’ve read a lot about it since then. Not talking about it doesn’t make it go away, you know. Even if my grandma isn’t here anymore I can still see them. But my Father never understood that.”

  “I’m so sorry about your grandma,” I said feeling a tug in my chest. I knew it was stupid to hope, but I prayed I’d never had to live without my Grandpa. “So you can see their auras?” I asked returning to our previous conversation.

  She nodded excitedly remembering why she had brought it up. “Yes, I can. Mr. Marcus’ aura is very dark. Almost black, this is never a good thing. Mr. Victor’s is not too bad. It’s gray for the most part, clouded, but it does have black spots here and there. And Felix’s aura is a little contradicting because it’s mostly blue. Normally that would be really good, but his has this black haze on it, surrounding it as if he had this doom influence on him all the time. Which I’m assuming is his dad’s.”

  She looked at me again and wrinkled her nose. “Just try to stay at a safe distance. Dark auras are not good to mess with. Stay out of their way.”

  I looked at her trying to figure out what to do with this information. It was all very interesting. I was strangely fascinated. “Can you see my aura?”

  She smiled and her face brightened, she was truly beautiful. “Yes! You have a special aura.” She looked at the top of my head, and concentrated. Her finger started dancing in the air like she was counting something. When she finished she smiled at me.

  “As I mentioned before, special auras have more than one color. Yours for example, has four.”

  “Four?” I asked a bit alarmed. “What does that mean?”

  She shook her head and chuckled, “it’s a good thing no need to worry. Some believe that it means you have an old soul, different lives lived and experience gained. Each color sig
nifies a life lived. Others believe that each color is a reflection of a part of your soul, the more colors you have the more complex or multifaceted your soul is.”

  I frowned. “What do you believe?”

  “A little of both,” she said shrugging. “My grandmother used to say that a soul couldn’t become complex without having experienced a bit of everything in life. Of course she also used to say there was always an exception to every rule.”

  “Like what?”

  “Ancient civilizations. The Egyptians, Mayan’s, Mesopotamian’s, the Druids. These people were so incredibly advanced that their auras contained the full spectrum of colors. They were believed to be a higher race. Some even consider them aliens. To build those structures, have that type of societies… those types of unwavering beliefs and consciousness. They were definitely superior. I mean we are talking about beings that influenced the way we live, to this day. They were incredibly knowledgeable and advanced, and many contended they were even able to harness and use magic.”

  “Wow, that’s intense,” wait did she say Druids?

  She nodded looking at her watch. “We should probably start heading back now.”

  I agreed absentmindedly. We got up and picked up the scraps of our lunch to throw away.

  “Which colors does mine have?” I asked while she placed the empty trays on the top of the table and we turned towards the street.

  She smiled again. “Well you have Purple, yellow, red and orange. It’s an interesting combination but your most predominant color is yellow. It means you are very clever, creative and really fun to be around.”

  I chuckled. “what do the other three mean?”

  “Well, they are complex colors but basically orange means you are very optimistic and enthusiastic about life. Purple means that you are intuitive as well as artistic. And red means you are spontaneous, energetic and really passionate.”

  I stopped and looked at her. My cheeks burned with mortification. She looked at me and chuckled.

  “It’s ok sweetie, you are a woman not a little girl. There is nothing wrong with being passionate. I mean I’m Latina so passion basically runs in my blood, but even if it didn’t, passion it’s needed to enjoy life. Otherwise, it gets boring. You know?” She stepped closer and slipped her arm through mine. We began to walk again. “Plus we are friends, your secret is safe with me,” she said with a conspiratorial look and I chuckled, my embarrassment fading.

  “I suspected there was Latin blood somewhere in you. Where are you from?”

  She shrugged. “I’m actually gringa, girlie. Born and raised here. But my grandmother was from Venezuela. She was beautiful. She came here when she was sixteen years old. Lived in Florida for most of her life, then met my grandfather. He brought her here to Seattle. They had a son, my dad, who married a Colombian woman, my mom, had me and lived happily ever after. The end.”

  We laughed and turned the corner. “So you have a Latin mother too?”

  She nodded, “Yep, I speak Spanish fluently, especially what I like to call ‘Este hombre me va a volver loca,’ language.”

  I frowned. “What does that even mean?”

  “Oh, it means ‘this man is going to drive me crazy.’ It is basically, anything my mother says to my Father in Spanish when she’s complaining about him.”

  We laughed. “So have you always lived here?” I asked.

  “Yep,” she answered nodding. “How about you? You don’t really have an accent, so it’s hard for me to place you.”

  “Oh well that’s because I have pretty much lived all over the country. We moved a lot when I was little. I lived in NY, Boston, Philadelphia, Dallas, Atlanta, Chicago, Phoenix, Los Angeles, and Vegas… although some I was a baby so I don’t actually remember them. If it was big city and had an impressive library, Grandpa had to live there. We only moved here when I was ten and it was just the two of us so that was it. I guess he really liked it here because we never left.”

  “Wow, what about your parents?”

  I sighed then shook my head slowly. “They didn’t make it. They died when I was a baby. My Grandpa raised me,” I left it at that. I didn’t think our first lunch was “lets share tragic stories that will depress you for life,” appropriate.

  “Oh I’m so sorry.” She said sincerely just as we entered the building.

  “It’s ok.” I shrugged not knowing what else to do.

  “What’s your Grandpa’s name?”

  “Neil. And your parents?”

  “Dilia and Charles.”

  “Do you have a good relationship with them?”

  “Oh yeah I love them, although they are still every bit the pain in my beautiful Latin ass, they are expected to be,” she chuckled. “But I love them. They live here. My mother calls me once a week to ask me when I’m meeting someone and getting married. Then says ‘ese cuerpo no te va a durar toda lavida mija!’ it basically means, ‘you won’t have that body all your life so get to it’ And my dad keeps asking me which case I’m working on. I lost count of how many times I’ve told him I’m a receptionist, not a lawyer. It’s so annoying.”

  We laughed and stepped out of the elevator. We got to her desk.

  “You want to do lunch tomorrow too?” She asked hopeful.

  I nodded thrilled. “But can we bring lunch from home? I can’t really eat out every day,” I said a bit embarrassed.

  “Perfecto! I love cooking and there is this pasta recipe I’ve been dying to try. I’ll make it tonight and bring for both of us tomorrow. Would you like that? I promise I know how to cook. You won’t get food poisoning or anything like that. I mean you could get food poisoning but it won’t necessarily be from my cooking. It might just be two completely unrelated events that just happen to go down at the exact same time. It would be a horrible coincidence of course, but you never know, it could happen.”

  I laughed while she sighed.

  “I quit. You know what I mean. Right?”

  I laughed again and nodded. I really liked her. “Sounds like a plan. See you tomorrow at the same time.”

  I walked down the hall with a smile on my face. I had a friend. My very own, real life, breathing and living friend. I felt like skipping the rest of the way but I wouldn’t dare. People already thought I was weird. Skipping and singing would not help my case. My heart started racing as I approached my cubicle. Thoughts of my other friend, and his wicked dimples filled my mind. Would he still be there? He had promised to wait for me until I returned.

  My heart flipped inside my chest when I reached my cubicle. Cyn was there, sitting in my chair and staring at my computer like it was an algebra problem he needed to resolve. Ugh, I hated math. By the look on his face, he probably hated it too. I stepped into the cubicle and he turned towards me. The most beautiful smile lit up his face, and just like that I lost the battle. I’m not exactly sure what I was fighting against but I was absolutely certain I had lost. His eyes twinkled as if he was looking at the most amazing thing he’d ever seen. I blushed and walked forward. He got up from the chair.

  “My Goddess,” he said motioning for me to sit.

  “Bri,” I reminded him and he chuckled, amused. I wonder what the hell was so funny.

  “How was your meal? Did you enjoy it?” He asked crouching down so that he was at eye level.

  “It was really nice.”

  “What do you wish for us to do now, my Goddess? Any thoughts?” He said with the most sensual half smile I’d ever seen. I sighed. I could count with both hands the “thoughts,” I had about things I could do with him. Three of them included his dimples.

  I cleared my throat. My cheeks burned responding to my thoughts.

  “Not really. Oh I know, why don’t you tell me more about you? Anything you want to share. I’m all ears.”

  He smiled knowingly. He had caught my reddened cheeks. As if possible, his smile widened.

  “Very well…”

  *

  CYNWRIG

  I could not describe the thing
s she did to me. Just seeing her cheeks turn deep rose in that manner. Inches away from me, made me desperately want to uncover what she was thinking about. I would hazard a guess that whatever she was thinking of doing with me I would be deeply satisfied by. If it were in any form close to what I wish I could do with her, then she would be deeply satisfied as well. But I should not allow my mind to think such thoughts about her. I found it nearly unmanageable to control the reactions of my body when I was this close to her. As it was, I already had the image of her, massaging her breasts the night we met and the outfit from last night. Those thin “shorts” and “tank top,” pj’s she had called them. Seeing her bare skin in that form, her legs, had done something to me. It had made for a very flustered experience on my part that night. All I wanted to do was hold her in my arms, body against body and claim her as mine. She had to be mine. I was not certain whether or not I deserved such a glorious being but I knew there was a reason why we were connected.

  I gazed into her eyes. She expected my response.

  “I was born and raised in Glandore, Ireland. My parents were farmers and I grew up working the land with them and my brother, Art.”

  “You have a Brother?” She asked in wonder and I chuckled.

  “Yes, he is a special one, my brother,” I chuckled, “We used to get in all kinds of trouble together growing up. Or should I say, he used to get in trouble and drag me along while I tried to aid him out of it. He is younger than I but only by a year physically… Mentally, well, that is a different debate,” she laughed and my heart reacted.

  “What kind of farm?”

  “We grew vegetables, squash, carrots and potatoes and we had livestock as well.”

  Her eyes grew with excitement at my words “Really? I’ve always wanted to live on a farm. With chickens and cows. I can totally pull off farm chic fashion. And I love braids,” she chuckled at her own comment. “What kind of animals did you have?”