The Crystal Circle: A Paranormal Romance Novel

by L. Rosenman

  The Crystal Cycle

  Liora Rosenman

  All rights reserved. Copyright © 2016 Liora Rosenman

  Reproduction in any manner, in whole or in part, in English or in other languages, or otherwise without written permission of the publisher is prohibited.

  Translated from Hebrew by Michal Friedman and Hadar Moran

  Contact information: ros.l.books@gmail.com

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1: Michal

  Chapter 2: Joe

  Chapter 3: Saul

  Chapter 4: Lynn

  Chapter 5: Lynn, the Uprooted Camp

  Chapter 6: Saul

  Chapter 7: Yossi and the Police

  Chapter 8: Lynn

  Chapter 9: Lynn

  Chapter 10: Saul

  Chapter 11: Eilat Police Station

  Chapter 12: Lynn

  Chapter 13: The Police Station in Eilat

  Chapter 14: Raul (Saul)

  Chapter 15: The Rosen Family

  Acknowledgments

  This book is dedicated to my husband Lior, who is supporting me in every possible way, helping me turn my dreams into reality.

  It is also dedicated to my children who express their appreciation at every opportunity. To my editor Liron Fine who accompanied me throughout my long journey on Amazon. To Ofra Shefer, my literary editor, whose tips and guidance were wonderful. To my translators, Michal Friedman and Hadar Moran, and my editors, Kristie Stramaski and Julie Phelps, thanks to whom you are now reading this in English.

  To Benny Carmi and his marketing team, without them I wouldn’t be able to bring you, my readers worldwide, this extraordinary story.

  This book is also dedicated to my first readers who kindly helped me with their comments and wise advice, and to you, my current readers, for giving me the privilege to enlighten you with another aspect of the reality in which we live in, that you possibly did not know existed...

  Crystal

  A material configured in a solid form, in which a basic cell repeats itself across the entire space and creates an evident internal order.

  Typically, the internal order of the crystal can be seen even from the outside, and provides the crystal a very beautiful and symmetrical shape.

  The Crystal Circle Laws

  Convening a meeting: Each member of the circle, looking at his reflection in a reservoir of natural water, can summon the meeting.

  The meeting summoner must express a clear intent in his heart to acquire assistance.

  Attendance at the meeting: All members will attend every meeting, including those yet to be materialized.

  Chapter 1: Michal

  06/16/2013 - Three o’clock in the morning. Southern Tel Aviv

  At first she didn’t know where she was. The next moment she realized she didn’t know who she was, and in the third moment... she sat up in the street and tried to look around.

  The city streets seemed strange to her. The building leaned over her, its face paved with dozens of rectangular eyes; some illuminated and some dark, some with yellow, white and even orange eyes. Her head was heavy; in it were dozens of bulldozers digging roads and tunnels. The noise was unbearable.

  She didn’t really remember at what stage of the night she’d left the pub. She’d had a lot to drink. How much? She’d stopped counting at the third glass. The lights of the few cars moving on the road at this late hour of the night blinded her. She tried to get onto the sidewalk and stumbled into some garbage cans, scaring a couple of cats in heat. The cats began howling terribly. From the balcony upstairs, a neighbor yelled at her and cursed.

  She turned right at the corner, barely managing to hold herself upright, leaning on the greasy, graffiti-covered walls: ‘Art Or Death,’ ‘ALeX the ZomBie,’ ‘NietZsche IS dead.’ Her eyes blinked and watered. Her head ached. Her mouth was dry. ‘Water,’ she murmured through parched lips.

  The heels were unnecessary. She removed her sandals and continued to walk barefoot, the cold sidewalk stinging her feet.

  She sat under a lamppost, letting her head fall forward. What was she doing? Where was she headed? She rubbed her eyes in an attempt to disperse the fog in her mind.

  A woman in a red dress crossed the street at a brisk pace and stopped next to her. “Are you alright?” she asked. An alcohol-saturated hiccup clarified the situation. “Come on, I’ll give you a hand,” she said with a soft tone. The woman helped her up and asked, “What’s your address?”

  She shook her head wearily.

  “Do you have any money for a cab?”

  She looked into the foreign woman’s eyes and shook her head again in dismissal, then closed her eyes.

  “Well, come to my place. I live near here. In the morning, we’ll sort it out, all right?”

  She let the foreign woman support her. The woman’s spotted scarf tickled her face. There climbed a lot of stairs. A light went on and off in a stairwell. Beyond that, she couldn’t remember a thing.

  Late in the morning

  A noise caused her to wake from her sleep. Maybe it was a door slamming? She rubbed her eyes and peeked out of the window above her head. Her stomach began to growl. She sat up in bed and heard nothing. This house… Who lived here? The bed and the window, with its white frame and greenish curtain, were foreign to her. Familiar... Perhaps? She touched herself. Her body was covered with a white nightgown, and under it was a flowered skirt. Whose clothes were these? She put her feet to the floor and instinctively placed them in the slippers spotted with a leopard print. The smoke in her head billowed… Her throat was dry. She rose from the bed and went into the hallway. Her legs carried her, following the scent of frying food, into the kitchen, where the remnants of a fresh omelet, still oozing, sticky and yellow, clung to a pan on the stove.

  She examined her surroundings in amazement: country-style cabinets with a bright marble counter, a milky cereal dish rested on the table, and there were breadcrumbs on a knife sitting on the counter. This kitchen was outdated and ugly.

  There was a yellow note on the counter: Good morning. Make yourself some food if you’re awake. I’m in the shower. Was the note intended for her?

  Her neck was stiff and she massaged it with a sigh. A stuffed bird fell from a shelf in the kitchen. She looked at it with loathing and surveyed the contents of the refrigerator.

  A slice of bread. Where is the knife? Cheese.... she took a bite from the bread, the thick fog still controlling her mind. What should she do now? Who was she, anyway? She couldn’t quite remember. Perhaps if she dialed the last number she’d called... She picked up the phone attached to the wall and dialed.

  “GGA Insurance, good morning. How can I help you?” came the detached voice of a clerk at the other end of the line.

  “I… want... “ She didn’t truly know what she wanted.

  “What’s your name, ma’am?” the clerk asked impatiently.

  “My name is… my name...” She hung up, pondering the question at hand. That was just it. She couldn’t remember her name. Nor did she know whose house this was or where she was headed. She felt a sense of urgency. She must know. Immediately. That dizziness in her mind... like she was drunk.

  Certificates of appreciation hung on the wall: Linda Weiner - Volunteer of the Year at the Naomi Shelter for Girls; a certificate of appreciation on behalf of the municipality of Tel Aviv for taking part in the street patrol protecting the homeless.

  Am I homeless? A wanderer? Is that why I’m here? Who is this Linda? Maybe I’m her?

  She rifled through the drawers in the bedroom. It seemed clear that this was the home of one woman. No man. No children. In the bottom drawer, she located a
passport. The face that appeared, smiling and satisfied, angered her. Indeed, her name was Linda. Curiously, there was a certain similarity between them. Linda also had curly hair and bright eyes. Yet, it was hard to say they were truly similar. Maybe this is how I used to look. She looked at the yellow note: angular handwriting, a tad angry. Is this note meant for me?

  She looked at the mirror in the room. She saw a young, tall woman with dark, honey- colored curls and green eyes that were a little reddened by fatigue and alcohol. Even without makeup, she saw herself as beautiful.

  She approached the mirror and stared deep into her pupils. Something there was moving and fluttering... What was it? Something small and white, like a miniature butterfly. It approached her and stepped out of the mirror, standing up beside her. The white creature had turned into a man. She looked at him, an older man dressed in white, smiling at her with a mesmerizing, beautiful smile. His eyes sparkled with a gray light. She gripped her arms and her eyes widened.

  “Don’t be afraid.” He took her hand. “You remember me.” She remembered him, but wasn’t sure from where. It felt like he’d been there for her for ages.

  “Your name is Linda. But I like to call you Lynn. You’ve reached a meaningful phase in your life, Lynn. A point where your life - as you knew it - ends. You’re now faced with a new challenge. And you’ll stand up to it. What do you do now, Lynn? Try to remember! What do you do?”

  She saw a vague and elusive figure, a feminine silhouette, beaming from her eyes in the mirror. It grew and assimilated and melded into her and filled her heart with infinite sadness. She and the character became one. Yes, now she knew: she was Lynn, of course. And this strange apartment was probably her flat.

  “We shall meet again. Hurry up,” said the man in white. He took her hand again, picked up the yellow note, stuffed it in his pocket, and walked toward the mirror. His figure shrank into itself until it disappeared completely in the pupils of her eyes.

  It seemed like she was regaining her memory, at least in part. For seven years, she’d been stuck in this apartment, at this miserable stage of her life. Men came and went, and she had no one in the world to embrace and not one shoulder to cry on. Her parents had died a long time ago. Her friends had left her, one after the other, over the years... The confusion in her mind gave way to rage building up inside her, anger that clawed its nails into her flesh until it bled and then flooded her eyes with boiling tears.

  Within a minute, all deliberations and decisions passed through her mind. She remained alone, still stuck in the same place, in this old apartment with its crumbling walls, in southern Tel Aviv with a monotonous, unrewarding job as a sales promoter. Her lease would end in two weeks and she wasn’t planning on keeping this apartment. Where would she go? This is, indeed, a meaningful phase in life, she thought. If there was still a point to this life, she would find it elsewhere. It was time to move on. The period of mourning herself was over. She wouldn’t return to that job. The streets of southern Tel Aviv were dark, gloomy, and distressing. She needed to cut herself off.

  I need to cut all ties with this present. It must pass swiftly and become the past. Only when I’m in a different place, shedding everything that characterizes me, will I feel free enough to walk into the future.

  She took a deep breath and looked back into her reflection. She straightened her shoulders, and a tiny smile emerged, perhaps the first in weeks. Okay, no more Linda. From now on I will be Lynn, like he said I was. These clothes… not to my liking. She sighed. They are so extravagant and tasteless! I am suffocating. I have to get out of here. She hastily dragged clothes from the drawers and emptied the contents of boxes until she found what she was looking for.

  The bathwater continued to flow, but Lynn didn’t hear it. She was busy. She took a small trolley suitcase from the top shelf and packed it with two days’ worth of clothes – any she could find without a leopard print - a bathing suit and some underwear. She quickly finished packing. After a brief search, she found all that she needed: a mobile phone, several hundred-shekel bills, and a few hundred dollars. A credit card? No. She decided to leave the credit card at home along with her ID and passport. She wanted to disappear. She must start with a clean slate without anyone finding her, especially not the guy who had abandoned her last winter. Never again.

  As she hurried out, a large map on the wall caught her eye. At the edge of the country, on the southern border by the sea, lay a small town that magically attracted her: Eilat. “I’ll go there,” she decided aloud. As she dragged her suitcase down the stairs, her

  first-floor neighbor’s door opened.

  Lynn nodded to her with a little smile. “Hello, Esther. How are you today?” Esther looked at her in amazement, then wrinkled her forehead. She didn’t remember at all where she knew the woman from. On the spur-of-the-moment, Lynn took out her cellphone and put it in Esther’s hand. “Now it’s yours, Esther. Goodbye.”

  So it was, not long after waking up, Lynn left the house wearing flat shoes in order to avoid accentuating her height. She walked with her suitcase in hand toward an uncertain future, one that was more promising than her past. Lynn arrived at the central bus station. She approached the counter and asked for a ticket to Eilat.

  “Round trip, ma’am?” the cashier asked. Lynn looked at the cashier with depressing uncertainty. What did she have to lose?

  “One way,” she said flatly, ignoring the piercing gaze of the cashier. Does she know me? Who is she? Lynn looked around the collection of people who always seemed to inhabit the bus station: soldiers on their way to the base, people on their way to work, housewives with baskets on their way to the market, foreign workers...

  One man looked at her strangely. Who is he? Did I know him before? An elderly woman stumbled into her and blurted out, “Hey, you watch where you’re going! What’s with you?”

  Lynn felt guilty and a stray tear formed in her eye. A thought infiltrated her head: This woman reminds me of Mom. Then another: Mom? But she’s nothing like the picture on the wall... in the flat. Who was my mother? Her memories were blurred, faded like an ink painting submerged in water.

  Waiting for the bus to leave, she drank some coffee and ate a sandwich, and already she felt better. The decision was made. There was no turning back. Half an hour later, she sat on the bus, her forehead pressed against the windowpane, watching the city vanish behind her. To her right was a stocky, dark-haired businessman in a suit and tie, who drank from a bottle hidden in his bag throughout the trip. Across from her sat a curly-haired young man in a T-shirt and shorts, who constantly played with his tablet. She didn’t respond to the mundane, polite questions asked by her neighbors. What would she have answered, anyhow? The gentle shaking of the bus caused her to sink into blissful slumber. Just before she fell asleep, a few words appeared in her mind: Call a meeting. The answer came as she was being swept away in waves of sleep: Eilat. Everything happens in Eilat. There, I shall face the challenge.

  Eilat

  The wheels of the bus shuddered when they reached the bus station in Eilat. In mere moments, she was out of the station. Hello, Eilat. I don’t remember when I last walked your streets, but I’m glad to see you. My name is Lynn, and I’m alone in this world. Perhaps, here, I’ll find the clean slate I’m hoping for?

  She was tired and her head still hurt. She squinted in the strong Eilat sun and dragged her small suitcase behind her, as did the other passengers. But they were with their families, wearing vacation smiles, or they were businessmen with jackets over their shoulders, or girls with waving mini-dresses, all rushing for taxis or to other places while she remained on the sidewalk, trying to breathe in the awful heat. “It’s a bit like being inside a huge hair dryer or roasting in the hot fumes of a volcano,” she mumbled under her breath.

  An energetic young man dressed in shorts approached her. “Taxi?”

  “No, thanks,” she replied. “Maybe later.”

  He looked at her for a moment, appraising her body and imagining t
he feel of her curls in his hands, and then sighed and left.

  First, she had to sit down somewhere, get some coffee, and figure out her next steps. She crossed the road and went to the nearest café. Thirty seconds later, the young, curly-haired man who’d been sitting near her on the bus crossed the road as well. She looked at him briefly, but he bowed his head and continued on up the street.

  Lynn sat and thought with a cup of coffee and a croissant before her. She realized she had to find a place to stay. Eilat was a lovely resort city built around an ocean bay with many hotels around, but she figured she wouldn’t be able to afford a hotel for more than a night or two. The amount of cash she had was small and she couldn’t remember her account number, or what bank she belonged to.

  No! She suddenly became frightened. That’s how they’ll track me down. Track me down... well, who’ll come looking for me? Lucky I left the credit card in Tel Aviv! That way, there’s no temptation to spend what I don’t have. It’s actually very simple; I have to find a job.

  “Should I bring your check?” asked the smiling waiter, nipping her inner dialogue in the bud.

  “Yes,” she nodded, but then stopped him. “Wait a minute - are you hiring right now?”

  The guy sized her up for a second and then moved his hands apologetically. “Sorry, not right now.”

  She was too old, she knew immediately. They’d be looking for eighteen or twenty- year-old girls. She sighed, paid, and counted her remaining cash.

  “Say, you know where I could find a one-or two-star hotel around here?”

  The waiter raised his head and nodded to a building behind the shopping center where she sat. “There, the Flamingo. I think it’s nice and inexpensive.”

  Lynn stood up and stretched her dress on her body. The sun blazed in the sky. She crossed the road and hurried to the recommended hotel. The lobby was dim and the musty smell mixed with tobacco stuck to the brown leather armchairs that had been worn-out since the swinging seventies. The receptionist welcomed Lynn as she entered. He was, apparently, also the owner, a sweaty little man wearing a blue shirt, a cap on his head, and a toothpick stuck between his teeth. His gaze was thorny. He said the price was 30 dollars per night and that she had to pay up front. She paid.