When I got home, I was a little late. My mom didn't seem overly concerned, which was new for me since she was usually so strict, but I didn't challenge it. I told her what happened at Subway in more detail, and that I just sat and studied over at Finn's, which wasn't entirely untrue. We did study, in a way, it just wasn't schoolwork. I went to my room and laid on my stomach on my bed with my new journal Finn had given me. I looked at the pages that Finn's dad drew on and wrote on the following pages what he had explained to me so far. I made notes on what I thought about the other elements, and when I had written all I could think to write, I went back to the first page that was left blank. It was curious. It was almost midnight, but I thought Finn might still be up.
I texted him, "Are you still awake? I have a question."
He responded a few minutes later, "Yes, what's up?"
"I was just wondering why the first page was left blank in the journal."
Soon after my phone vibrated, and I answered quietly, "Hey."
"Hey, yeah I forgot to say that traditionally in a journal, the first page is for protective symbols so that it won't be read by anyone who isn't meant to read it, and if you choose, you can assign yourself a new name for you magickal Self. But if you want, I can talk to you more about it another time. For now, just keep it somewhere safe." When he finished, I was quiet, thinking about all of the different symbols and feeling a bit overwhelmed. "Elise?" he asked, "are you still there?"
"Yeah, I'm here," I told him. "I think I will definitely need you to talk to me more about that. Maybe this weekend when I come for the bonfire, if my mom doesn't stay. A new name? Why?" I asked.
"Well, it's only optional. A lot of pagans choose a magickal name that they only go by at festivals and during ritual. It's like a name for your spirit-self, and it's kind of part of being reborn, as far as your enlightenment. So then you call your new self whatever you like."
I thought about this for a while, then asked, "What's your magical name?"
"Mine is Breandan BlackMoon. And keep in mind, since this is a name you choose for yourself, you may change it again later if it no longer represents you, as you level up."
"Oh, ok. I'll have to think about it now."
"Yeah, it takes a little time to choose. Sometimes you have to wait until you feel connected to something to choose a name that fits, but there's no hurry. In the grand scheme of things, it's not really important."
"Ok, well I guess I should try to sleep now, but I'll come over again tomorrow."
"Alright, I love you, Mo Cuishle. Good night." I still feel butterflies every time he says that.
"Good night. I love you too, Mo Cuishle."
We hung up the phone and I danced around and giggled while I was getting ready for bed.
I repeated my process of stilling my mind, as I had done the night before, and I was able to fall asleep by 1:30.
When I got to school in the morning, I sat doodling on some loose-leaf pages I had folded into a small book. I stapled the edges together as a quick binding. I planned later to decorate the covers, but inside, I just redrew the symbols, without explanations, inside it. I drew a pentacle. I drew the triangle symbols of the elements. I couldn't remember which one went to which element. Then, I drew other representations of the elements. I tried to draw some curly lines for wind blowing, and a flame, and a tree, and a river. I was about to draw animals that I thought would match the elements, but Finn pulled up next to me. I put my hand-made book away, and tossed my bag in the back floorboard for him to come sit in my passengers seat.
"Good morning," He leaned over and kissed me. I kissed him back. I was loving how natural it was for us to be able to do this.
"Good morning," I said back when we pulled apart.
He handed me a coffee and asked, "How did you sleep?"
"I have been sleeping better since I tried making my mind still like we did in the forest."
"Good." He looked at me for a while, then suddenly, he smiled and said, "I wrote you back in the notebook." When he pulled it out of his bag and handed it to me, I thought he might be blushing a little. I tucked it between my console and my seat, and then I reached for his hand. My hands were cold, as they always were now, and I warmed my hand in his while I sipped at my coffee with the other.
"Hey, Finn?" I said to him.
"Hmm," he said, before flattening my hand between his and raising it up to his mouth to blow hot breath on it and rub his palms over my hand to help warm me more.
"You told your parents you were cycling energy with me in the forest. Can you do it again, and teach me?" He stopped rubbing at my hand and, lacing his hand with mine, rested them on his lap.
"Sure, actually, that's a really good idea. But let's wait until my dad finishes explaining the elements to you. That will help."
"Ok," I said. I wanted to level up as soon as possible, but maybe if I knew how to call on the elements by myself, I could work on my own. Feeling empowered, and ready to move forward, I suggested that we go ahead and walk to our lockers.
After school, I called my mom while I followed Finn's car to his house and told her that I would be there until my curfew. Finn's parents weren't home yet when we got there, so we went to his room and closed the door.
Finn took off his shoes and changed his socks by the closet. I sat on his bed and took my shoes off too. He came over to the bed and crawled up to lay beside the wall. He left his arm open and gestured for me to come lay beside him. I was wearing some gray leggings under some jean shorts with my black tee shirt. I tucked myself against him and rested my hand on his chest. He smelled like mint and cologne, and an earthier scent beneath that, but I didn't quite know what it was. I looked up at him and he said, "I loved your letter, by the way. I'm glad you feel that way. I say more in my letter to you, but I want you to know that you are special." He stroked at my face, from my chin along my cheek to my ear and back down again.
I closed my eyes and just felt him. He moved on rubbing his other hand up and down my arm from shoulder to elbow. I tucked my chin and laid my head against his shoulder. I opened my eyes and drew little circles with my fingers on his chest.
"I meant everything," I said. "And I'm glad you aren't like anyone else. I realize this is rare, our love, but I feel that it's true. As true as love can be. Like a fairytale love, only deeper than that too. You know?" I continued drawing circles and didn't look up at him.
He just rested his hand on the back of my head and began tracing my ear after he moved my hair back. It tickled, but I didn't want him to stop. "I know what you mean," he said. Then he brought two fingers beneath my chin and tilted my face up to his. I locked eyes with him and he stared deeply into my eyes. His eyes moved down to my lips, and his lips parted slightly. I closed my eyes and parted my lips as well, and he came down and met my lips, turning on his side. We held each other and made out for what felt like a long time, but with each new kiss, I felt breathless. We opened our eyes and kissed each other. Then, he started playfully sucking my breath from me, until I asked what he was doing. "I'm taking your breath away," he said grinning.
"Well, in that case, you don't have to do that to accomplish taking my breath away. But since you stole it away, I'm stealing it back." I leaned up and kissed him, teasing his lips open wider with my tongue. And when he was kissing me back, I sucked in the air from his exhale before we parted. I closed my lips and swallowed the air.
"Hey!" he said, then suddenly I had to burp. I sat up quickly and turned my head away, letting out the burp and covering my mouth. I looked back at him, smiling around my fingers, and we both started laughing.
We heard the door close, and we knew his parents were back home. To avoid any embarrassing jokes, Finn and I left our shoes in his room and went out to the living room to sit on the couch. We weren't going to worry too much about schoolwork, since he and I both tended to study ahead anyway. He put in a movie, and we snuggled together. I tucked my feet beside me on the couch. His parents came in after going to their room first, and leaned over the couch on either side of us. I tried to lean away from him, but Finn held me close, and said to his parents, "Hey, Mom and Dad."
"Hey, guys," His mom said in an eerily cheerful tone, "Why don't we just order pizza for tonight."
"Yes!" Finn's dad exclaimed. "What kind of pizza do you like Elise?"
"Um, pepperoni is good, but I'm really not that picky. I like almost anything."
"Excellent! Now, turn the movie off. We still have lots to cover." Finn's dad said. Then, he followed his wife into the kitchen to order the pizza.
"Oh, crap, I left my journal at home. I hid it in a safe spot in my room last night, and I didn't want to bring it to school."
"Hey, that's ok," Finn said, leaning forward on the couch to reach the remote and turn off the movie. "You can just take notes on regular paper and transcribe it to your journal later. I do that all the time."
"Alright," I said, lowering my legs back to the floor. His parents came back in, and Finn got up to get me some paper and a pen. His parents sat on the opposite side of the coffee table on the floor. Before Finn returned, Finn's dad asked me, "So, Elise, have you given anymore thought to what we talked about yesterday? About the other elements we didn't cover yet?"
"Yes, and I asked Finn to teach me how to cycle energy like he did with me in the forest once I finish learning about them."
"That's a wonderful idea," his mom said. "In that case, let's discuss until the pizza arrives. Then, after we eat, you and Finn can go do that."
"But, there's so much more we can talk about and we don't have much time, Minerva." Finn's dad protested.
She lightly smacked his thigh with the back of her hand. "Hey," he said to her and she gave him a look. Finn came back and sat down on the couch next to me.
"What now?" Finn asked them when he noticed the look his mom gave his dad, who was eyeing her back playfully.
"Nothing," his mom explained. "Your dad and I will leave you two alone after dinner so you can teach Elise about cycling energy. It will help awaken her spirit, and we shouldn't worry about anything else until that happens anyway." She enunciated the last few words slowly while looking at her husband, and he seemed to realize what she had been trying to tell him.
"Ah, yes, of course, my wife is always right. In that case, where did we leave off yesterday?"
"Fire." I said.
"Right, so now we move around the compass. First, draw the compass from memory for me," he instructed.
I smoothed out the paper Finn had brought for me, and drew the perpendicular lines of a compass with the letter for each direction in their proper locations. Finn's dad watched me, and his mom got up and went into the kitchen, to make some tea presumably.
"Ok, good. Now do you remember which elements are associated with the directions?" he asked. I continued to write the names of the elements around the compass.
"Right," he said. "And do you happen to remember the other symbols I drew for them?"
I drew them off to the side a bit. They were still on my mind from when I drew them this morning. When I got done, I said, "I couldn't remember which went to each direction."
"That's ok." He pointed them out to me and told me. I labelled them as he went through each one.
"Ok, now, we'll talk about Water," he began, "Water is fluid, like wind. And it can mold itself into any container. It will always find a crack to slip through, if there is one to be found, but it is necessary for all life. It washes away impurities. It is a great force of nature that can destroy or help grow."
"I did think about this last night and I made some lists of things to associate with it. Like rain and rivers and fish."
"Ok, that's good. It could also be tears, or ice, or mist. And in ritual, we use things that come from water to represent it. Often, it's an abalone," he pronounced it ah-bah-low-nee, "shell." I wrote these down as he mentioned them.
Finn rubbed at my back and said, "I can show one later, and maybe some other things I use, if you want."
"Ok," I said looking back at him.
His dad moved on, and I turned back to him. "And then there's Earth. All of the elements are important, but Earth is easily more important in some respects because it is the womb for all the others. The Gods come through the Northern Gate, and when we connect to the Earth, we can connect to everything upon it. That will come later, however. For now, what did you think of for Earth?"
"I wrote trees, dirt, and snakes." Finn's dad laughed when he heard that.
"That's great. But don't forget rocks. Rocks of every kind. Not just stones like you see in the ground, but semi-precious gems too. There is much to learn about crystals. And herbs. We won't get into that yet, but keep in mind that getting to know the properties of these things will help you build up the right kind of energies for spells. There isn't really a wrong answer, as long as you have a clear idea in your mind of what they represent to you based on what you know about them, but the more you know, the deeper your connection will be to the items and the spell work. Magickal energy builds and is then released to do as you will it with your own power and your mind." I made notes of this.
"Finally, there's Spirit, which is a little different than the other elements. Sometimes it is referred to as Aether." He wrote the word for me. "Aether is the magickal essence of the Universe, and it is what breathes life into things. We have a spirit inside us, and we were breathed to life with this etherical energy. You're spirit within you cannot interact with the Aether of the Universe until you are awakened. I like to think of it as the Divine breath of the Gods. But whatever you think of it as, it is there, and we call on it to bring more power to our magick. Do you have any questions so far?"
I finished writing my notes and looked at them for a while before answering. "So, magick is used for what, exactly?"
"That's an excellent question. Magick is used for lots of things, but it isn't like a way to get out of doing your chores like Mickey in Fantasia. Mostly, we use magick to influence or understand things in our lives. We may interpret an omen and use a spell to protect ourselves or divine possible outcomes. We may do a spell to draw things to us or purify things from us. And magick isn't all spells either. Sometimes it is a potion, like Minerva's teas, or a poultice used for healing, or a charmed item like your amulet to help us live our lives. There are more advanced things to know, but that's enough for you to think about for now."
The doorbell rang, and he got up to greet the delivery driver and pay for the pizza. I finished my notes and folded the paper up into a small square. I tucked it into my pocket as Finn's parents came back in with pizzas and plates. Finn and I moved to sit in the floor, and we dug in. His mom asked me if I wanted some tea, but I told her water would be fine. Finn got up and went and made us two glasses.
"You said you weren't picky, so we just got a Supreme and a pepperoni with mushrooms." Finn's mom said.
"This is great. Thank you. It smells really good." I told her.
Finn's parents put a few slices of pizza each on their plates and went to eat in the kitchen. Finn and I enjoyed eating out pizza, and he turned on the tv to cable so something would be on in the background while we ate, but we kept the volume down so we could still talk over it.
When we were full, Finn took our plates and glasses to the sink, and I brought the pizza into the dining area so his parents could have more if they wanted.
"Thank you for the lessons. You're a pretty good teacher. I like the way you explain things, Mr. Kelly." I told Finn's dad.
"Oh, well that's reassuring to hear. You're quite welcome. And feel free to call me Owen."
"Yes, dear, and I'm Minerva. It never crossed my mind to tell you before."
"Ok, sure." Finn came to stand beside me, taking my hand that hung by my side.
"You ready?" he asked me. I nodded at him, and he told his parents we would be in the backyard as he led me away.
"What time is it? I told my mom I would be home by 9:30" Finn checked his phone and said, "It's 7:30, now."
We went onto the back porch, and he turned on a light. Then, he led me down the stairs and to the edge of the trees close to his shed.