ITS NOT OVER UNTIL I SAY IT IS!!!! I feel like I’m quoting someone in saying that, but I don’t know who, so just read it in your best “epic” voice and know that I mean it.
I’m not going to stop blogging until you change your mind because THIS ISN’T OVER!
Last night I went to movie night over at Melanie’s house. We watched Newsies, which was a great choice to help me feel more empowered and boo-yaka-cha! Nate was pretending not to be thrilled about it, but I could tell he enjoyed it just as much as the rest of us.
This morning I slept in a bit, but woke up feeling ready to achieve something great. I had some family togetherness breakfast and lied to my parents. I told them that I had come to the conclusion that the quest bureau was really wise and they probably knew what was best for me, and I was feeling much more calm and and ready to move on with my life now. Isn’t that terrible? I’d like to think I did it for their own good, but thats hardly a good reason.
After breakfast I went to go see Philemon again.
He told me to be good and go home, but I did not listen to him.
Then through my own resourcefulness I acquired Calen’s cell phone number and called her about 17 times before she finally picked up. So far my entire relationship with her had looked like stalking and creeper behavior, but I swore I’d be normal as soon as I got a chance to explain myself. That’s what I told her on the phone,
“Just talk to me one more time and I promise I’ll be honest and truthful and explain everything!” She resentfully agreed to meet me at the park by the library in the afternoon.
It was kind of a chilly day, but warm enough in the sun that sitting on the park bench was not completely miserable. Still I was sorrowful enough as I sat there waiting, wondering if I was doing the right thing. Eventually, in what seems to be her usual show-up-when-I-feel-like-it style Calen trudged up to the bench and sat down.
She didn’t look at me, but glared at the trees in front of us, looking angier than I’d see her before.
“So,” I said a bit tentatively, “I guess I’ll just start at the beginning.” I glance to the side to see if Calen was being any less frightening, but if anything she had become more fierce. So I stared at the grass and plowed right ahead,
“I’ve pretty much wanted to be an adventurer for my whole life. I mean, getting a job and just being normal always seemed like such a terrible ridiculous drag. I wanted to do something important and great and well, adventurous. I’d heard about the quest bureau growing up, how they were this great alliance that spanned the world, committed to the global cause for good. I signed up for a quest as soon as I could. I mean, it’s been my dream for years to get sent off to fight pirates or save orphans or smuggle supplies to some people in need. It all kind of seems silly saying it now, especially since I’m so pathetic.”
I paused for a moment and scuffed the grass with the toe of my shoe. It really did all feel impossibly silly now.
“I got a call from the Quest Bureau just about 2 weeks ago, they said they wanted me to come in early, because normally no one even gets a quest until they graduate high school. So I felt kind of special and awesome like all me dreams were coming true,”
I paused again, this was probably the worst part to say, so I tried to get it out really quickly,
“But then when I got my quest instructions it just said I was supposed to be friends with you. I’m sorry! I know thats a dumb reason to be stalking someone and following them around, because I didn’t even know who you were before I got that letter. But since it was the quest bureau and they’re supposed to be all wise and important I just went with it. Or I guess I tried to be your friend, I was probably just really annoying. I know it was selfish and awful but I thought I was doing a good thing. You know, like in the global fight for good. But now my quest is cancelled or suspended for no reason at all, and no one will tell me anything. It would be totally fair if you hated me now, I just thought you deserved some sort of truth, one of us does at least! But thats really all I know! Sorry…really sorry….”
I took a deep breath and sat up really straight, bracing myself for whatever came next.
“Stupid!” Calen spat out the word with disgust, “I should have known it was something stupid like that!” She stood up suddenly, her eyes blazed and then filled with tears, “And Josh, THAT LIAR!” She stood there looking quite capable of either great violence or a total emotional breakdown. “I HATE THE QUEST BUREAU” she screamed so loudly and fiercely that a couple of mothers walking strollers across the park turned and looked worried.
I jumped up and stood right in front of her, pleading,
“but aren’t they supposed to be the good guys, I mean I’ve always heard about them doing good things?”
“Are these good things,” she hissed, “have they ever done ANYTHING good for you?”
“Well, no, not exactly,” I conceded, “at least not that I know of.”
“Well I can tell you for a fact that they, whoever ‘they’ are, have done nothing for me. I fact, they have been nothing but- ,” she began to waive her arms around searching for a word bad enough. “Let’s put it this way, I am not someone who has much of anything to feel real great about in my life, not a whole lot of ‘good.’ But what little I did have, the quest bureau messed up pretty nicely for me.” She glared at the ground for a moment and then turned her fury on me, “and I suppose sending you along was there idea of a replacement friend of something. Ha!”
She laughed in a rather frightening way for a moment. Then looked at me as if deciding what to do with me. I risked a question,
“So how do you know Philemon, or um, not Philemon?”
She let out a long hissy breath and finally said, “long story.”
“Do you want to talk about it,” I ventured.
“We are NOT friends,” she said with the same creepy deadly calm that I remembered from the first time we met. Everything logical in me was screaming ‘run away, run away’ but there was some small, clearly insane, part of me that responded,
“You are absolutely right. But right about now I am also feeling a plot coming on, that I think you may be interested in.”
“Oh really,” she sounded completely unconvinced.
“Hear me out for 5 minutes,” I said, “and decide for yourself. We’ve got a common enemy here, and I think in some circumstances that might be better than being friends.”
She was still looking at me sort of psycho-killer-like, so I told her very quickly what I was thinking. I will not write here what we are now both thinking, because I don’t want anyone to try and stop us.
But soon enough, you’ll know.
mystupidquest 