Chapter 11

In shorter terms, Freya was the daughter her mother wished that she had instead of a rebellious child like her. Selene didn't mind it one bit too. She felt like Freya's constant need to please her own mother was due to the lack of one in her life. She felt like it gave her some sense of purpose and maybe that was not so bad at all.

When they were kids, whenever she would want to do something a little adventurous, Freya was the one that always made it look like they were doing a horrible thing. It was this incessant need to please but she didn't have so much of a choice. She loved her like her own sister which is what she was.

The sun blared hot, mercilessly scorching very single thing in its path. She was so late.

Class had not extended or anything but the traffic had a way of throwing a fully formed wrench in her plans. The same traffic that somehow didn't let her meet up with class.

She hated this city but here was where the fun was at. It was all here. Her mother was glad that she didn't move so far away even if she still had.

She walked towards the parking lot of her apartment where her car was parked as she winced from the effect of the sun that was burning her. It felt like tiny droplets of magna were being scattered all over her delicate brown skin.

Thank God for melanin, she reminded herself. So she knew it could be much worse should the tone of her skin be different.

There were three of them and they'd all been inseparable since they were little girls. Herself, Freya and Cirilla.

All afternoon, Selene had tried to take her mind off the danger that they were all in as she drove.

She had no way of fighting something that big. Something like the thing that attacked her the other night. This was indeed a new feeling for her. Why did she see things that did not concern her? Why was she powerless to affect it?

It felt like she would at least have some power to affect the situation but so far, she didn't feel all that elated. She didn't feel all that empowered to keep the whole world from becoming hell on earth. Because that was his plan.

She lightly shook at the mere mention of his name.

His very existence made her tremble and not in a good way. She still had a vivid recollection of his eyes. Those eyes looked like nothing good. They glowed red and radiated of pure evil. No one could gaze into them and remain the same, ever.

She didn't feel whole after partly staring into his eyes. It was like it sucked the joy out of you without leaving anything.

She had always thought that hell was just a place that was told to children to scare them into being good. She had always imagined it being a witch and all.

The reality of that story was much more terrifying than anything anyone could have ever made up.

She had been driving for the last twenty minutes when she pulled up at her work place.

Freya and she worked together. It was just Ciri that had a job as a nurse in the hospital in town. She had studied medicine so no doubt, her parents were more than proud of her. Her mother would more than emphasize on how she could have been doing more with her life like Ciri.

She pulled into the parking lot, bringing her car to a halt as she opened the door to dash out into the diner.

She tried her best not to use magic as much in front of normal people but right now, she sure was feeling very tempted to teleport but that might bring out her grimoire depending on the level of magic that she needed to make that happen. She was guessing to teleport from one place to another would at the very least require a sizeable amount of magic to make that happen.

She groaned inwardly as she dashed into the diner, rushing to the back of the kitchen.

"Hi Steve." He called into the direction that the manager was.

Steve was a nice guy but he had a way about him sometimes.

"Selene?" he said in shock. "What are you doing here and here? Where is Freya?" he said, leveling a barrage of questions her way. So it did not matter what she was going to say to do so long as he believed her.

"Err," she began to say as soon as she noticed that his attention was on her. "We swapped shifts." She managed to tell him.

She had been hesitant to tell him that as he was really opposed to his waitresses swapping shifts. He never really gave a reason why but all that she knew was he didn't like it.

"I thought I told y'all I do not like that." He said with a southern drawl to his tone.

She knew how he felt about it but now was not the time for her to indulge him. She just needed to get done with this shift so she could leave.

"You know what, just get changed." He said dismissively as he waved her off with one hand.

She was just thin the very same thing as she dashed to the back. There were a host of customers that needed attending to and she was going to get to them all, she told herself as she dashed into the changing room at the back to change into her apron.

"Order on table five." She yelled into the back as she had come back with a note that contained what the couple on table five wanted to have for the evening. It was a really nice evening to be taken out on a date although their place was not the most ideal choice for a date but at least he nice looking girl had someone that wanted to take her out to eat. Somehow, she felt a pang o jealousy at the bottom of her gut.

It was something that she had never had and frankly, never given a thought. Maybe it was that inexplicable feeling of loneliness that she never could understand. Maybe that was why it was always there no matter what. It was a hollow and empty feeling that was nestled at the back of her gut. It made her feel sort of empty in a way.

She quickly shrugged off the thought as she handed the piece of paper to one of the cooks at the back.

"Coming right up." He said amidst the music that was playing in the diner.

It sort of set the mood and made it feel very homely in a way.

She got a hand wave from one of the customers at the back. It was wild how her shifts always brought in more customers than anyone else's. Her mother often joked about it and said that he carried good energy around her. It was the only thing that sort of made sense to her.

Her shift had practically escalated in a couple of hours that she'd come to work. It was as if the customers tripled. They were so back in on orders that if she wasn't herself, she would have been overwhelmed. Frey would have been so glad that she was not the one here.

The diner was quieting down a little bit, giving her time to actually breathe.

"You can take a rest now. Things seem to have died down on this end." She heard Steve say from the corner of the diner as he himself was taking out his apron.

Selene sighed as she took off hers too, heading back to behind the counter.

Finally, she could breathe easy. This shift had been so hectic.

She connected her phone to the speakers as she started playing her favorite song at the moment. It was this indie but uncharacteristically fast tempo type of song that made for a good slow dance but not too slow.

She started to dance as she began tidying the place up as she got in the groove.

She'd been stressed with this whole situation for far too long and she would have said now was the best time to let loose and it was indeed working.

She moved her hips, swishing her to the rhythm that the song offered.

"What're you doing?" She heard someone say from behind her causing her to almost jump out of her skin.

"Shit! Fuck! Don't scare me like that."

"Relax." Freya said, reaching out to hold her arm as a way to calm her down. "You were so engrossed in whatever that was that you didn't see me coming. That's on you sweetie."

"What're you even doing here? It's your day off." She told Freya.

"Well, technically it's not. But you get what I mean." She added as she resumed her dance but taking Freya into account as she was very close to her.

"What're you doing?" She asked her.

"Can't you tell?"

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