Tell Me Your Secrets Chapter 4 by: Drakira The last Lore Keeper of the Weres disappeared without a trace, now thirty years later his legacy returns in the form of a young man named Michael Williams.

Chapter 4

8 October 2011

I woke up the next day feeling somewhat groggy, but not too bad from the usual wake up. It was Saturday, thankfully, which meant that I had some of the morning to try to figure out how to open the box. I didn’t need to go into the comic book store until a little before ten that morning to help open the store and start my shift.

I went through the morning routine of starting the coffee-maker, a shower, and scraping my face. I never enjoyed shaving, which is why I tended to only do it every other day. However, since I had work, that meant I had to shave. While I ran the razor blade over my face, my thoughts drifted back to the box.

“Ah!” I exclaimed, softly. I had nicked myself while shaving my stubble from my face, again. It seemed that I always did that whenever I was shaving.

I looked at the cut in the mirror, and this cut looked long, but thankfully not deep. I finished shaving by wiping my face off with a wet rag, and then headed for some of the coffee that was percolating in the pot in my small kitchen.

After pouring some of my coffee, without adding anything to it, I looked at the box on the table. It was just like it was when I left it last night: closed, locked, and not wanting to readily tell me what was inside. I walked over to the box, with my coffee in hand, wanting to see if the morning light could reveal anything that I may have missed last night.

I sipped my coffee and set it down on the table, and then picked up the box and examined it once more. A few moments later, I felt something like water beading on my chin. I quickly wiped it off with one of my hands, realizing that I probably had water left over from when I wiped my face off after shaving.

While I was looking at the box, I saw a couple drops of blood from the cut drip onto the box.

“Crap!” I yelled, setting the box down and rushing over to the counter to get a paper towel to wipe it off.

I managed to wipe the blood off of my chin before it got everywhere, and made sure that I clotted my shaving wound before it could do any more damage. I went back over to the table to inspect the box and to make sure that the blood did anything to it.

However, when I looked at the box, there was no blood.

“That’s odd,” I said aloud, “I could’ve sworn there was blood on this.”

I inspected the box, and noticed that the lock seemed out of place, like it had been moved somehow. My curiosity getting the better of me, I trying the deadbolt, and to my surprise, it came loose.

After opening the lock, I gently opened the lid of the box, eager to know what was inside. I didn’t know what I was expecting to find when I opened the box, but inside was a jeweled ring. Silvery in color, the ring had an emerald set in it, just over where your knuckle went. I thought I could make out strange symbols along part of the ring, but it might just have been a trick of light. Shifting the ring, I did see some symbols that were engraved along the outside, as well as few on the inside. I was guessing that they maybe Celtic symbols, since the ring’s appearance fit with what I knew of that area.

I thought to myself, ‘Maybe Alex or her mom might know something.’

Then with a sudden realization, three thoughts first came to my mind once I began examining the ring. The first was that I should tell Alex right away, and see what she and her mom thought about the ring. The second thought was to try on the ring to see how it looked, and then go show Alex about my discovery. The third thought was to find someone who knew about rings and then try to sell it to make some money. I wasn’t strapped for cash, but a little extra spending money never hurt.

I was leaning towards the second option at the moment. I didn’t want to sell it, until I found out it was just someone burying a ring in a box, like pirates burying their treasure. Also, for some reason, the lure of trying the ring on for size seemed very tempting.

A half an hour later, I was on my way to the comic book store, walking my bicycle out the door. I decided to slip the ring on my finger, just so that I wouldn’t lose it. I didn’t think anyone would really notice me wearing a piece of jewelry around town, so I wasn’t afraid of any scathing remarks that might be tossed in my direction.

As I set my bicycle on the pavement, I heard the caw ring out through the air again. I groaned, but paid the bird little attention. I think I was getting used to hearing birds follow me wherever I went these days. The ride through town was uneventful, just had to dodge my way through the streets and avoid the Saturday morning traffic.

I arrived at the store where the owner was unlocking the doors to the shop.

“Mike, you’re just in time,” he joked.

“Thank you, Mr. Larson. I try to be on time,” I replied.

“Mike, sometimes you need to loosen up a bit,” he answered laughing.

Mr. Larson meant well, but when I was on the job, I took it very seriously. I knew that acting professional, no matter the job, would pay in dividends in the long run.

The day proceeded pretty normally for a Saturday. I laid out the new comics from the storeroom, kept an eye on the counter, and perused the latest comics myself while I worked, when no one needed any help, of course.

Things didn’t start to get interesting until a few of the regulars showed up, among them were Greg, and that new girl Tracy. They were browsing the new DC comics, with Tracy and Greg both lingering on the new edition of Green Arrow and Justice League Dark. For some reason, I thought I had seen Tracy somewhere before but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Before I could ask them if they needed any help though, Alex came in to the store.

This was definitely a first, since I have never seen her at the store for as long as I have been working here. I forgot about the others, and said, “Alex, what can I do for you?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the two of them leave. Greg looked disappointed that they were leaving, like he was missing coming here with a friend and enjoyed the time that they had spent here together.

My attention quickly shifted back to Alex, who answered, “Hey Mike. I decided to come by to see if you had any luck opening the box.”

“As a matter of fact,” I started.

I looked around the room to see if anyone was listening, and then motioned her to come closer.

I continued in a whisper, “Yes, but all I found was a ring.”

“A ring? You mean like the One Ring in ‘Lord of the Rings?’”

She giggled at that, and I smiled.

Lifting my hand up, I continued, “Not quite.”

Alex looked at the silvery band on my right hand, “Wow, this is a beautiful piece of jewelry. I wonder why someone would just throw it away in a box.”

“I don’t know. Maybe they didn’t want it anymore and didn’t want to insult whoever gave it to them by selling it?”

“That could be it. It would definitely give them an excuse to bury the box with the ring inside on our beach.”

“Yea,” I replied. “I’m thinking about selling the ring. I heard there was a pawn shop in town, and I was thinking about going over there later to see how much the ring is worth.”

“Are you sure you want to do that to something that looks this good?”

“Yeah, it would be nice to make a little extra money. Unless you know someone who might want it.”

Alex laughed, “I don’t know anyone at the moment, but you should hang on to it for a while. Maybe give it to that special someone?”

“I don’t know if I’ll ever find her. I would probably be better off with the money.”

She sighed disappointedly, “Well, if that’s the way you feel, who am I to stand in your way.”

She stepped back, and said, heading for the door, “I guess I’ll see you around. Thanks for showing me the ring before you sell it.”

She left the shop and I felt my heart sink to the floor. Seeing her walk away, disappointed in my decision felt really horrible. I felt like I let her down somehow, and now I wasn’t sure how I was going to make it up to her.

The day continued on slowly from there. I felt like I was on autopilot for the rest of the day, interacting with the customers as much as I needed to, instead of trying to engage them in conversation about some of the titles they were purchasing.

“Hey, kid,” a voice said concerned to me, near the end of my shift.

“What?” I replied, looking for the voice.

It was my boss, Mr. Larson. ‘Crap,’ I thought to myself, ‘I’ve been acting like a robot, and he’s probably going to chew me out for that.’

“Is something the matter with you?” he asked, acting like a father would.

“What? Oh. Yeah, I guess.”

“Want to talk about it?”

“Would it help?”

“It might, you never know.”

“Alex, one of the girls who came in earlier, she was disappointed in me because I’m thinking about selling something that I found in a box that I dug up on her beach last night.”

“I see, and what did you think of it?”

“I thought that she made some good points, but I was confused when she brought up an interest in finding the one.”

“Ahhhh,” he said, with the expression that this was somewhere that he had been before.

“What?” I asked.

“Kid, let me give you a piece of advice. What Alex just did, was flirt with you, big time. Whatever you did before finding whatever you found, made a good impression with her. She’s interested in you now. Maybe, you ought to rethink selling what you are going to sell.”

“Maybe, I don’t know. I wasn’t interested in getting involved in a relationship with anyone anytime soon.”

“Sometimes these things just happen. A wise person once said, ‘Carpe diem.’”

“Seize the day?”

“Yup. Your shift looks like it’s nearly up. Why don’t you go find this Alex, and try to make it up to her while there is still daylight?”

“Thanks, but I don’t know what to do.”

“Just be yourself, kid. Now go on, try to make something of this.”

“Okay, thanks, Mr. Larson.”

“Anytime. Just don’t let it affect your work, okay?”

“Got it, sir.”

------------------------------

I left the store shortly afterwards and unhitched my bike from the nearby rack. I looked around and listened, but just heard the normal everyday noise that a college town makes. ‘Strange,’ I thought, ‘where’s that bird now?’

I set off down the street towards my apartment. I did intend to call Alex back and try to make things right with her. There was something about her that Mr. Larson managed to pick up on that I know I was beginning to realize. It did hit me that it would be good to have someone like her as a friend, and hopefully more. I couldn’t really explain it, but I was drawn to Alex for more reasons than her looks.

I headed down the street on my ride, thinking about how I would try to make it up to Alex tonight. I didn’t pay too much attention to the passing cars, just enough to make sure I didn’t get run over by them.

The ride home was actually kind of nice, with the cool breeze blowing against me. It wasn’t too strong to force me to pedal harder to actually get somewhere, but it deal feel nice to not be as hot as one could riding in the sun. I was actually enjoying the tree-lined streets when I heard that damn bird again. It was cawing very close to me, and I starting to wonder if it would ever just leave me alone.

I brushed it off and ignored the bird, focusing more on the ride back to my apartment. I didn’t want to be distracted by something like that when riding, else I could crash, and I have crashed my bicycle in the past before. They weren’t the most pleasant of memories I had, but it did teach me to be more careful when riding a bicycle on the road.

The last accident that I had was when I was riding my bicycle through the country roads near my home. I was just cruising along when an RV came out of nowhere, racing through the hilly curves. The surprise and shock sent me careening into the gravel near the side of the road, but thankfully not down the hill through the grass. Also, my bicycle wasn’t too damaged by the impact; I just seemed to scratch the paint.

My legs and the arm that hit the gravel were scratched up pretty badly. Large bruises with blood trickling down my limbs. I managed to walk down the hill towards the place where my mother was working and where my father was swimming in the pool. Thankfully, along the way I ran into a couple of kids who managed to relay my injuries to my father. He came by in his pickup and took me and my banged-up bicycle back home.

Glancing around after taking that unexpected walk down memory lane, I noticed a large black SUV nearby. A car blared its horn from behind the SUV, while the driver motioned for the other car to go around it.

I saw the frustrated driver of the other car go around, shaking her head in frustration. I glanced back at the SUV thinking, ‘Does it have engine trouble? And if it does, shouldn’t its warning lights be going off?’

A realization hit me on the head, ‘Was that car deliberately following me?’ I thought to myself, turning my attention back to the road ahead. I thought about it for a bit, and then I realized that it had been following me since the second intersection from the comic book store.

‘Crap!’ I thought to myself, as I kicked it up a notch on the bike.

The large SUV didn’t accelerate much, but it did a little bit. I raced onto a nearby street, which was free of traffic, and put the pedal to the metal. I looked back and to my annoyance, the SUV maintained its pursuit.

Grumbling to myself, I scanned the area ahead, trying to find some way to use my size to my advantage. I could hear the large SUV’s engine getting closer as it sped up trying to catch me. Looking frantically, I managed to come upon an alleyway that led near the school. It was one of those alleys that opened up into a parking lot behind an apartment building.

I thought about going that way, except that I didn’t know where it would end up at. Looking further ahead, I could see part of the park that the university was sitting on. That would be a better place to go, since there would be people walking around, and I could hopefully lose the SUV on the various sidewalks that crisscrossed the campus.

Seizing the moment, I swerved to the other side of the street, and up onto the sidewalk. I wove in and out of the various people that were walking the sidewalks that afternoon, and in no time at all, I managed to make it to Ravencrest Park. I headed down the path that was in the general direction of the forest, not really aiming where I was going, only hoping that I would lose them and find a way to make it back to my apartment in one piece.

Hearing a loud noise, which sounded like an engine revving into gear, I looked back and saw the SUV right behind me, using the sidewalk as a road.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I shouted, as I pedaled as fast I could.

The black SUV was probably using an all-wheel drive, from how it was bouncing up and down over the small hills that wove in and around the park. It was knocking over garbage cans here and there, and somehow managing to avoid the benches and lampposts that were along the walkway. I tried to keep my eyes ahead, thinking that I would know it when they caught up to me. I shouted to the various coeds that were relaxing in the park to move and get out of the way. They looked at me like I was crazy and only moved as soon as the SUV entered their field of vision.

I saw the ever growing outline of the forest directly ahead, and hoped that the closeness of the trees would deter these guys from chasing me in there. The trees seemed like they were miles away, and all I could do was hope that the adrenaline that was running through my body wouldn’t run out anytime soon.

Eventually, I made it to the tree line, and dove down one of the nearby bicycle paths. I looked back quickly, on one of the short straight pieces of path, and I saw the men park the SUV nearby and get out of the car. I thought they were giving up, but that hope quickly disappeared when one of them pulled out a dirt bike from the back of the vehicle.

“Why can’t I catch a break?” I said to myself, taking off again down the trail.

I made it about a few hundred yards before I heard the revving of the dirt bike behind me. I thought to myself, ‘Whoever these guys are, they must want something of me pretty badly.’

I inwardly wished that there was some way that I could hide from these guys. Looking ahead, I saw that the path split in two. One way, the trees thinned out some, and the trees thickened going in the other direction. I was about to take the thicker road, when I saw a band of cyclists on both trails.

Thanking for the change in luck at last, I took off toward the bikers where the trees began thinning out, as I could see something glinting off the sunlight along that way. I wondered what was shining in the distance, when I thought that something felt off about me. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but the revving of a dirt bike engine drove the thought from my head. I clearly had more important things to deal with at the moment, like how to hide from these crazy people.

I pedaled as fast as I could to catch up and join the pack. I hoped that the cyclists would provide good camouflage for me so the person on the dirt bike would either go the other way, or pass me by and not notice.

I managed to close the distance fairly quickly to the cyclists. ‘I must’ve caught my second wind,’ I thought.

I quickly closed into formation with the cyclists, and tried looking back without being obvious about it. I could see the dirt bike rider stop at the intersection and look both ways. He probably was seeing the two packs of cyclists now; I turned my attention back to the trail and the pack of cyclists that I was with. I was inwardly hoping that I would blend in with them, and he wouldn’t know which group to go after.

I heard the revving of the dirt bike and turned back to look. I breathed a sigh of relief as he began to head back the way he came, giving up the search for now, since he probably couldn’t decide which group of cyclists to go after. Looking ahead, I could see the lake coming up fast. That’s what I was seeing, the sun’s reflection of the water. I slowed down my pace to something much more relaxing. From the lake, I could figure out which way to go to head back to my apartment.

A more relaxing ride later, I managed to make it back to my apartment in one piece. Something about me still felt off, but I was starting to feel really tired from the ordeal and was thinking about putting it off until I took a shower. I fumbled with my keys in my pocket, while I held my bike with my other hand.

‘That’s funny,’ I thought, ‘my jeans feel loose for some reason.’

I pulled the keys out of my pocket, unlocked the door, and went inside. Setting my bike by the front door, I quickly relocked and dead bolted the door shut. If those guys were still after me, I was going to take some precautionary measures. A secure door would buy me some time, hopefully enough to get away.

I dropped my clothes and climbed into the shower, relaxing in the warm water as it heated up. I kept thinking to myself that something still seemed off.

“Duh!” I said aloud. “The ring’s still on my finger!”

‘Wait a sec…,” I thought. ‘Is there something wrong with my voice? Nah, it’s just the shower acoustics.’

At least that’s what I thought before I took a good look at my hand, and screamed.